Gary Traczyk’s winding, gleaming stainless steel sculptures have an air of effortlessness about them. Despite their heft (they’re made of steel, after all), their flowing forms make them appear featherlight. Their fluidity may even give the viewer the sense that they were simply dreamed into existence.
Although the Miami artist admits that the ideas for many of his pieces have occurred to him suddenly – even effortlessly – making them real is a completely different story. The process involves earsplitting, spark-inducing circular saws, a procession of grinding wheels and sandpaper grits, white hot flames and high velocity water jets, not to mention the physical exertion of bending steel with his body.
Gary Traczyk’s mock-up of a 15-foot wall sculpture
And it also requires patience. Methodical, monk-like patience for sometimes grueling and repetitive tasks, each of which is essential to the whole finished work.
“A portrait artist knows that you don’t complete a torso in a few minutes,” Traczyk says, putting it in perspective. “You have to enjoy the process.”
Here, we’re going to give you a look behind the curtain at how this Miami sculptor does what he does, using as an example a custom wall sculpture he created for a commercial building off South Beach’s Lincoln Road.
Spoiler alert: The image at the top shows the 15-foot-tall work in its finished form and space.
Months before this first photo was taken, the sculptor created a mock-up of his vision for the client (see second photo).
He used a 20-foot length of foam board and blue tape, which enabled him to stand the model up on the wall where the piece would live, conveying the effect the final work would have on the space.
With this, the client was eagerly on board and Traczyk could begin sculpting. He started with 20-foot stainless steel tubes.
Raw steel tubes
He made these tubes into smaller pieces, cutting the edges at 45-degree angles with a grinder. He then welded small bits of steel to the open ends of each tube to give the appearance of a solid piece of metal, while maintaining a lower weight (since this would eventually be wall-mounted).
After welding, the tube ends had a rough, unfinished look. The artist’s next steps were to grind, sand and polish each to a mirror finish.
You can see the progression (left to right) in the photo below.
Stainless steel tubes being prepared for a stainless steel wall sculpture
He then repeated this process for dozens of steel tubes. Cutting, welding, grinding, sanding, polishing.
Traczyk’s next goal was to bring the pieces together to create a cohesive sculpture. We’ll reveal more about how that happened in Part II of this series – coming early next week.
Stay tuned!