Walnut, Sassafras horns, Ebony paste eyes, Mahogany base, Limestone rock with calcite shrubs.

15.5 x 8.5 x 19.5 inches - March 22 - April 19, 2006 - 82 hours

The long title to this piece is Grazing on Calcite Shrubs, but it's much easier to just call it Bison. Those really are calcite shrubs it seems to be munching on. That rock fragment was part of a collapsed cave ceiling I found while digging in a sink hole on my place. The eyes are made from a mixture of Elmer wood glue and Ebony filings. If combined in a ratio that allows for rolling into a not too sticky, doughy ball, this mixture dries as hard as wood and can be polished and oiled to about as good a sheen as solid Ebony. It's much easier to shape an eye this way than to carve solid Ebony into a round ball. The horns were made from a piece of Sassafras that had a natural curve to it. After inserting the horns, I decided they didn't look thick enough and so built them to greater thickness near the head using wood paste made with Sassafras filings. The bison is made from two pieces of walnut. Can you see the joint? It's just behind the front legs.

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