In a certain way I was forced into making 'vice' by societal changes. In the past my raw materials were always readily available from the surrounding environment. There wasn't a place in the world where it was not possible to roam the countryside and gather scrap steel; detritus of human occupation. In Tobago, steel water tanks dotted the landscape, toppled over by their owners with the advent of plastic ones. These six foot cubes of steel became the materials out of which I made 'papa bois' (photo right, click on him) and his collection of companions. In Antigua, very hot afternoons were spent hacking through thorny cassie bushes to access old construction machines, rotting in the forest invisibly like wartime waste. I would lug my torch into this graveyard, and, like an ant, cut carryable pieces off to transport back to my studio to make sculptures. In Colorado, it was a particular scrapyard that was my pasture. Located in the center of the city, it was a dreamy 'alice in wonderland' place, devoid of people but populated by heaps of scrap steel; helicopter rotors, school desks, sunflowers and rabbits. A ton of steel, gathered then, cost 125 dollars. It's ten times that now.
Steel, in all its variations, has become a precious commodity. It's turned small bands of people like me into armies of ants. The environment has been picked clean of old steel; new lead roofs of churches are stolen, stripped to be resold before the scaffolding comes down. Newly built infrastructure in struggling countries, especially copper, is immediately raped to sell to developing economies. When I was in Spain recently a stolen Chillida sculpture almost earned its purveyors 40 euros at the scrapyard! The yard owner recognized the sculpture as part of the Spanish national treasure and alerted the authorities. Throughout history however, better sculptures have been pawned for less.
In Wales, farmers sit on raw materials I would kill to sink my teeth and torch into, but won't part with them. They're not Doing anything with the steel; they just know it's valuable.
But as an artist you must create, even within a seeming vacuum. You'll find anything to work and adjust to your satisfaction. Marble, marbles, clay, driftwood, or metal.
The least expensive steel these days are the chunks that have already been formed into functional items that, for some reason, have lost their value due to their no longer functionality. If taken at weight value, these objects would be considered very valuable, but for some reason, a defunct functionality renders them useless, and therefore cheap.
