A Razorbill without a head (flying buttress figurine)

Presawing in the snow

The next flying buttress figurine for St. Eusebius's Church in Arnhem is finished too. I've been busy presawing all the blocks that I had lying around for flying buttress 4 and 5 (read here more), before maybe a real frost period got in the way. Because my saw sits outside, I cannot use it during frost, because then everything freezes immediately, if I even can get the water to the machine. As it was now it was only freezing by half a degree, and although a lot of snow fell and elsewhere on the terrain an old barn half collapsed by sheer weight, it had no consequences for me.

Reconstructing after an old photograph

What proved more difficult, was that the bird that I was going to copy into new stone was missing its head. A Penguin, so we thought. Must have been with its beak straight up, otherwise it could originally never have fit inside the block. But then it would have had very strange wings -doesn't a Penguin have straight wings?

After some emails back and forth an old picture brought some clarity: the bird had its head bent backwards. It looked more like a Dodo. However, a Dodo does not have the legs of a seabird… then maybe a Razorbill? Although the bird in the old picture still didn't really look like a Razorbill, out of all options (Dodo, Penguin, Puffin…) that came the closest. So that was it going to be, and preferably a bit like in the picture.

Soon I also found photographs and drawings of Razorbills that came a bit closer. I made a new head of plaster and after approval copied the bird into new Muschelkalk limestone.

This stone can be very dense or contain some fairly large holes. This block was quite open. That should not matter constructively. The brown layers wash out, but the stone remains strong enough. These are simply characteristics of the stone.

To the next flying buttress statue.