Design Goodness

Michael Binkley on the Art in the Garden Tour 2012

michael — Fri, 18 May 2012 04:15:48 +0000

We will be one of the participants on the Art in the Garden Tour produced by the North Vancouver Community Arts Council. This annual event marries select North Shore gardens with visual and musical artists. This year, we will not have our extended “Sculpture in the Garden” show. We will be open Saturday and Sunday, May 26 and 27, 2012 from 12 noon until 5pm daily. As in previous years, we are a unique destination, as we are the host garden as well as the featured visual artist in the garden. We will also host photographer Alan Jeon, whose work …

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Is Social Networking Effective?

michael — Wed, 16 May 2012 18:09:14 +0000

Here is an example of how it is. I posted a blog on the Seymour Art Gallery’s annual “Start with Art” exhibition a few weeks ago, and I posted a link to it on my Facebook page. A woman whom I graduated from high school with, Kelli is one of my Friends. She has a young family of her own and now lives in Langley, BC. Her son is quite talented artistically and she and her husband are encouraging that talent – something that pleases me, as I remember my own family’s encouragement of me. Kelli saw my post and …

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Searching for the Lost Sculptures Project Update

michael — Sat, 12 May 2012 04:42:27 +0000

I started a Facebook project last year wherein I am searching for pictures of sculptures that I have carved in my 30+ year career as a professional artist. I estimate that I’ve carved over 10,000 creations, including utilitarian items such as flower vases, firerocks, benches, and knives as well as tons of fine art sculptures. These have made their way to every continent of the globe, but I did not photograph every single one. I have been asking my collectors to take a candid photograph of their Binkley and email it to me along with the date it was carved, …

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Michael Binkley Female Torso Sculpture in Marble

michael — Wed, 09 May 2012 04:04:07 +0000

This is another sculpture (left) that was inspired by another artist’s work – this time by Frank Zeilder. I was first introduced to painter Frank Ziedler at a group show at the CityScape Arts Space in North Vancouver several years ago. He was showing one of his large pen and ink drawings which captured both my and Michelle’s interest. In October, 2010, Frank and I shared an exhibition in the same gallery, and several of our pieces married very well together, though we had not collaborated on any of the creations beforehand. One of Frank’s drawings, titled “Sweet Peas” (right) …

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Michael Binkley Abstract Sculpture in Brazilian Granite

michael — Fri, 04 May 2012 05:13:34 +0000

For the month of September 2008, Michelle and I were in Pietrasanta, Italy. I was working at Studio SEM, partially carving several marble sculptures which we had shipped back to Vancouver so I could finish them in my own studio. At the end of our stay, we filled a shipping container with these crated sculptures as well as raw marble blocks and other assorted stone. One of these was a beautiful large piece of granite from Brazil that was blue and reminded us of our deep blue Canadian sodalite. We had hoped to entice one of our Vancouver sodalite collectors …

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Michael Binkley Participating in the 2012 North Shore Art Crawl

michael — Wed, 11 Apr 2012 19:51:50 +0000

We will be participating in the second annual North Shore Art Crawl which is coming up in two weekend’s time. We’ve shaken off the wooly blanket of winter, done a shake-down of the garden and I’ve created some new sculptures for the gallery. We will be open on Saturday and Sunday, April 21 and 22, 2012 from 11am to 5pm. The North Shore Art Crawl is organized by Norm Vipond and Sandrine Pelissier, both North Vancouver visual artists. Taking the cue from the enormously successful annual East Vancouver Culture Crawl, Norm and Sandrine wanted to emulate the event on the …

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Michael Binkley Abstract Stone Sculpture, “Invitation to a Pearl”

michael — Tue, 10 Apr 2012 06:38:12 +0000

This sculpture is another in a series of abstract forms that I have done. Take a look at my discussion of another similar piece, “Gesture and Flow”. In “Invitation to a Pearl” I again use the ellipse as the outside edge of the composition. This piece is part of a series of elliptical forms that I have sketched that include an opening in the form that reveals a variety of other forms. This sculpture is an ellipse orientated horizontally and a curvilinear opening cuts all the way from end to end. The negative space reveals a sphere that is partially …

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Michael Binkley Stone Sculpture Titled “Gesture and Flow”

michael — Thu, 05 Apr 2012 06:32:21 +0000

There are several shapes and forms that pervade in an artist’s mind through their lives and recur in their compositions. There are the elliptical compositions of Raphael, the egg form in Brancusi’s work and the straight black line of Mondrian to name but a few. Two shapes I continue to pursue are the pear and the elliptical forms. In the sculpture “Gesture and Flow,” I use the ellipse as the outside edge of the composition. This piece is part of a series of elliptical forms that I have sketched that include an opening in the form that reveals a variety …

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Michael Binkley Demonstrates Fretting Technique

michy — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 06:42:29 +0000

There are numerous techniques for carving stone and each depends on the type of stone, the scale of the sculpture and the complexity of the composition. This short video shows me working on a large, abstract sculpture which I am carving from Carrara Petacchi marble. There are over 65 different types of the lovely white marble that is quarried in the mountains above the famous Italian town of Carrara. The Petacchi quarry yields this grey/white variety which has striations of grey veining and has a high content of magnesium, so the marble can live outdoors in cold climates. Since the …

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Michael Binkley Carves Optical Illusion Sculpture

michael — Mon, 26 Mar 2012 06:21:40 +0000

Inspired by the optical illusion of the picture of the two faces or a vase (above left), I created the sculpture which I titled “Octavia” (above right). I used a piece of Belgian marble, which is deep black in colour and has a fine, almost invisible grain. To see more views of this sculpture, visit my website. Is it a sculpture of an octopus? Can you see the head and mantle on the left with the siphon curving down and four of its eight arms curling to the right? Looking at the sculpture this way, it seems like the octopus …

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