Program 2011: Blacksmithing and Metal Forming at the Center for Metal Arts

Online, January 2, 2011 (Newswire.com) - The Center for Metal Arts in downstate New York announces a blacksmith's sizzling hot Winter 2011 workshop schedule, with classes for beginners in blacksmithing and hands-on workshop topics for advanced metal artists. For these small, hands-on classes, the Center for Metal Arts provides individual work stations in a fully-equipped teaching studio

Vivian Beer, former resident blacksmith instructor at Penland, will lead a Basics of Blacksmithing workshop on January 22, 2011. (Snow date January 29.) Learn hands-on how to execute the fundamental forms of tapering, twisting, upsetting and spreading, and why and when you would use each technique. Learn ergonomic work with the hammer, and how to coordinate the hammer hand with the eye. Learn the use of well-engineered blacksmithing tools, and how to use the anvil faces to produce different forms.

Vivian Beer is a talented metals artist whose Red Rocker was a hit at the International Contemporary Furniture Show. She has an MFA from the Cranbrook Academy of Art and held the blacksmith residency at Penland School of Crafts. She has taught at Peters Valley among other venues. In January 2011 she is artist in residence at SUNY Purchase.

Vivian Beer's Basics of Blacksmithing class is ideal for the beginner who has never held a hammer, or for someone who would like more instruction in the basics of blacksmithing. A day in the studio with this rising young metal artist is always challenging and inspiring. Expect spaces to be sold out for the limited seating in this hands-on class. To see more of Vivian Beer's work, go to www.vivianbeer.com. One of her award-winning pieces is in the studio gallery at the Center for Metal Arts.

Blacksmithing Primer with Andy Dohner opens on February 19, 2011 (Snow date February 26). Andy says a class with him begins with learning how to use the body to move the hammer, and then how to use the eye to visualize where and how you want that metal to move. Andy cut his teeth in the culture of Bethlehem Steel, where he learned to weld leak-proof underwater seams. Andy is the go-to guy for apprenticehips, from his years of traveling coss county to work with blacksmiths in a self-guided apprenticeship. He has recently returned to the northeast and is ready to teach you as much as you want to learn.

Andy will not only walk students through the basics of forging: taper, upset, and spread, but he will talk about when and why you might choose a particular technique-what end result are you going for? Andy comes to blacksmithing from a practical, technician's background, and he appreciates forging as a survival skill. "If I'm hungry," he says, "I want to know how to make a fork."

The Basics of Blacksmithing class is a good match for the novice, or for the student who needs more practice on the basic forms. With an individual work station for each student there is limited seating in this hands-on class.

Vivian Beer returns March 19-20 (snow date March 26-27) to teach Hot Sheet Forming: Planning & Practice with Vivian Beer. This class will examine, use and abuse sheet/plate metal as a material for architectural and artful blacksmithing. Participants will learn to sink, raise, bend, roll, weld, and construct. All exercises are designed to understand the specific possibilities of forming sheet material. Be prepared to work hard and generate a box full of samples for further explorations.

This is a class that combines original inventive thinking about the manipulation of hot sheets with the tools and techniques of the metal shop. If you want to know where this class can go, look up some of Vivian Beer's recent work with manipulated sheet work on google images. Vivian Beer's innovative hot sheet work and precison surfaces make her an artist to watch as a rising star with a tremendous reservoir of talent and evolving conceptual works.

Fred Crist, who has lead a series of master classes at the Center for Metal Arts, will be back for a 3-day intensive on Forging the Grotesque, on April 1-3, 2011. Dragons and griffins and leaping wizards! Spend three days at the anvil learning the techniques of dimensional Renaissance forging with a master of the classical traditions. Learn how to create these fantastical creatures of the Renaissance under the instruction of a contemporary sculptor.

After Fred Crist graduated with an MFA in Sculpture from Philadelphia College of the Arts, he spent ten years immersed in the rich tradition of European Renaissance forgework at the Yellin Studio on Arch Street, Philadelphia. Samuel Yellin was called "the devil with a hammer" and Fred plans to bring some historic Yellin museum pieces to use as studies. See and work from original Yellin pieces, as well as some of Fred Crist's own work, learning the process and tools needed to create these Grotesques. Discuss different styles and ways to incorporate them into larger elements. This is a 3-day intensive, with enough time to delve deeply into the art of the Grotesque, and to make some pieces of your own.

The Center for Metal Arts offers easy online registration at www.centerformetalarts.com, or call 845-651-7550 for more information. Ongoing one-day workshops in copper fold-forming and other topics will be announced on the website and on the Center for Metal Arts facebook page.