Another How-To from WorkingCreativity.com

Make something with rocks and bailing wire

Making it.

Ingredients: Common rocks (egg-sized and smaller) and 18-gauge anealled (oiled) steel wire--which will look even nicer after it rusts.

Tools: needle-nosed pliers (for cutting and twisting the wire), lineman's pliers (for cutting and pulling the wire), and antibiotic/pain relieving ointment (I managed to nick and cut my hands up quite a bit on the many pointy wires).

Recommendation: If I was to do this, again, I'd use a thinner gauge, more pliable wire. The 18-gauge wire was hard to work with--to wrap, bend and pull. A smaller gauge wire would be easier to work with and likely provide all the support and structural integrity you would need with rocks of this size.

Step one. Wrap thirty or more rocks in strands of wire--creating a little cage for each rock. I generally used two strands of wire. I used the first strand of wire to make two "loops"--one around opposite "ends" of the rock. The second strand of wire was wrapped perpendicular to the first set of loops and used to make one or two more loops around the rock--the second wire wrapped around the first strand of wire whereever it crisscrossed it. Two examples of wrapped rocks are shown in photo above.

Step two. Attach the rocks to each other by threading loose ends of wire through cages of other rocks and wrapping or twisting securely. The wire wrapping doesn't have to be perfectly tight but it's good if it's at least anchored in place so it doesn't slide around a lot. If making bowl or pot, start at bottom and work up layer by layer, creating the shape you want by considering how each new piece will contribute to that shape. The shape I created is shown in the photo below.

Optional step three. Cut off excess wire or trim as you want.

Getting here.

The idea of creating this vessel of stones and wire arose when I was working on the "Clay Pot." Whenever I am working on something, my brain likes to pose alternatives (e.g., "what about bending the wire this way?" "what about using some other material?"--how would this work, what would it look like, etc.). One of the first thoughts I had was wondering how it would look if I used rocks instead of broken pieces of terra-cotta. I figured it would look really cool, too. Janice and I worked with a lot of rocks in our "cement block sculptures" and we still have a lot of rocks in boxes and buckets around here. So thinking of rocks seemed pretty natural. Because the rocks are a lot heavier than the broken terra-cotta pieces, I imagined I would need to use a heavier gauge wire for the rocks. Other than that, I figured I would be ready to build a stone pot after finishing the clay pot--using the same methods and tools.

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