Elevating the Lowly Bison
My Bison Boulder outdoor sculpture has now been sitting out on the Western hillside for a week. Yesterday’s strong and somewhat violent rainstorm brought with it an almost instantaneous golden patina to the sheet metal “fur” of the bison head, hoof and tail. I knew it would rust to a dark brown in a few months, but it is interesting to see the rapid onset of the oxidation from the rain. It is all very metallurgically and chemically rational, but its still strange to see it grown tinged before our eyes. I actually think that the oxidation has accelerated from this morning to this evening. After paying some visiting workmen to move the bison head from its transport truck down to the boulder site (accomplished by six men and a large handtruck to bear the weight, which I estimate to be 350-400 pounds), we did our best to position the pieces where they would be going. After buying a cluster of heavy-duty ratchet straps, one of the workmen and I managed to tuck the head up fairly tight to the boulder and do the same on the smaller front paw rock with the hoof piece. Then, several days later on a Saturday morning, Handy Brad and I attacked the hoof and tail with a Sawzall and cut them down into a tight fit to the rock from which we expected we will eventually bolt them into the rock itself. We also reconnoitered the head to determine how we were going to move it into the proper place (which I estimate to be 2-3 feet higher and 3–4 feet towards the house so that the bison looks to be glancing towards the house over his right shoulder). This way, the elongated neck fabricated by the metal sculptor will be less prominent and the bison will assume more of the no-neck look common to the American Bison.
Moving something of 400 pounds up 3 feet and over 4 feet doesn’t sound like a massive undertaking, even out on the rocky hillside of the chaparral. I actually thought we might be able to use the simple “machine” of the ratchet straps to do the job, but no such luck. The deadlift is simply more meaningful than a mere ratchet can handle. The first idea was to rent a Genie Lift that we could use to hand-crank the head upward. Those can lift up to 450 pounds and as a 195 pound wheeled piece of equipment, our biggest concerns were muscling it down and up the rocky slope and providing it with a perfectly flat platform from which to operate (this was of particular concern to Handy Brad, who I am considering renaming Level-Bubble Brad). Then Handy Brad got it into his head that we should rent a little tractor with a lift to do the job. We went to look at them at Home Depot and while I was wondering how I would ever fit into the small caged cab (Handy Brad has never been accused of being Daring Brad and had no plans to drive the thing), we were told we needed a 3/4 ton pick-up to haul it and we were a quarter ton shy of that standard. However, we also got a closer look at the Genie Lifts and I became convinced that the original plan had more merit than the more expensive Bobcat rental.
Yesterday’s downpours gave the working men a reprieve and an added day for me to stare down at the Bison Boulder and stew about the right way to get the job done. This morning’s oxidation awareness added some urgency to my thinking. It’s like when people accuse you of watching grass grow. While that is a reference to an unexciting activity, watching a metal sculpture rust is definitely a metaphor for too much excitement and the notion that time is fleeting and all things rust and eventually go to dust. Cautious Brad was concerned about the muddiness of the ground around the Bison, so I was pleased to report to him that I thought the rain had actually firmed up the ground and what had been super-dry tundra was now firm and turgid with hydration pressure. That produced a dubious grumble, but he had to admit it was true. Meanwhile, Dave, who had suggested the Genie Lift in the first place, said he thought his son could bring his tank-tread mini Bobcat and lift and place the bison head with great ease. As for the rocky slope approach, that produced the heavy equipment equivalent of a big “Pshaw!”
It seems that Dave’s son is on his way to a well-earned desert getaway, but is willing to come by in the morning with his Bobcat to get the bison head properly positioned. He has quoted me an all-inclusive price to rent a trailer, bring his Bobcat, drive it down the slope and work the bison head issue to my satisfaction. We have an understanding that I will use the ratchet straps to temporarily secure the head into the desired position and prop it up (Dave’s insistence) with some scrap lumber, of which we have a growing pile from said deck work. There is a cleanliness of this in that if it takes ten minutes, ain’t we smart for doing this in this manner. And if it takes all day, sucks for Dave’s son, but that’s the deal. As a guy paying time and materials for my deck work, I’m ready for some bundled pricing on an esoteric assignment like positioning a massive sheet metal bison head sculpture. I am getting more like Handy Brad in terms of risk avoidance even though I am getting less like Handy Brad in terms of how quickly I’m prepared to throw money at a problem to make it go away.
While the head of the bison is the primary goal of the Bobcat work tomorrow, there is also the front hoof, the tail, the pelt on the hump and the back hoof to be concerned about. This is not about perfection, but it is about making the bison look as bison-like from the 50-60 yard distance of the boulder from the deck. This is a project of perspective. The boulders look particularly like a reclining bison from the angle of the main viewing area of gatherings, the deck and the dining room. The secondary viewing area of the guest room terrace has a less auspicious viewing angle, but should still have the unmissable vision of a bison in its view. I am ignoring any other perspectives since our Western slope does not lend itself to casual hiking or other neighborly sightseers. From the highway down below there is no chance that any of it is visible as the house is at best a rough form from there. So, everything in this project is about how the sculpture looks from the deck and little else.
While the head is a spectacular piece of metal work up close as well as from a distance, the other parts and how they attach to the boulder are faint images of appendages, ones that lose their credibility up close. Therefore, the trick will be to make the connections of the metal to the stone as realistic as possible. For that I have acquired two important prophylactics, cans of brown Rustoleum spray paint and a 9×13 outdoor mink-colored shag carpet. I have already used one of those shag carpets as the pelt, complete with ragged edges and sprayed randomly with brown paint. It looks very molting bison-like. The other will be used to fur-up the front and back legs of the bison with the spray paint used to detail the back hoof to resemble the metal front hoof. The spray paint will also be “artistically” used to highlight parts of the bison’s anatomy like the front shoulder and the back haunch. The hard part of this artistry will be to run up to the deck for perspective as I try this and try that. I guess it will be good exercise and whoever said art comes easy? I pride myself that through this art I will be elevating the lowly bison to a place of honor on our hilltop.