• A faun's garden bench for Twickel Castle

    background, Restoration
    garden bench Twickel
    The bench, before the fateful blow

    As I already explained in reported earlier I am currently restoring a garden bench for Twickel Castle with new sandstone components. First, I carved the legs, and now the other parts are being made. It's a somewhat strange bench,

    To the first post about this project.

    with a relief in lead on the backrest and limestone satyrs on the legs. I estimate the relief to be from around the middle of the twentieth century, maybe even later, and the legs are probably much older.

    I never quite understood what this composite bench was all about, until I received the picture below via e-mail this week. Now it turns out that this bank was composed purposefully around the theme of the faun or satyr. The older pieces at the bottom were perhaps already in possession, and with the music-making small faunts in lead and the relief with dancing nymphs and fauns, it all becomes one theme, even though the parts appear to stem from different eras. Unfortunately, the nice statuettes were stolen in the 1980s and since then the two sandstone spheres were just placed there.

    bench castle twickel with fauns, picture for 1980
    In the 1980s there were two music-making little fauns on the corners of the bench

    I'm currently working on the backrest of the bench. The lead relief is taken care of by the metal restorator, and from a new piece of sandstone I'm carving the basis for that. In the old situation this part was made of concrete, but as said a thick branch of an oak tree has done some irreparable damage to that as well. Fortunately not too badly to the relief itself; that was just bent out of shape and had a tear.

    The damaged relief before the restoration (detail)
    The damaged relief before the restoration (detail). It is bent and in the lower-middle part is a crack.

    The big challenge now is to ensure the sandstone follows the odd shapes on the back of the relief. That will of course never succeed completely, so the last bit will be filled with a restoration casting mortar.

    Read more…

  • Sandstone Sphinxes… or are they Satyrs?

    background, Restoration
    weathered limestone garden ornaments and garlands with sphinxes

    A thick branch of an oak tree in a big crash wreaked havoc on a garden bench at the castles of Twickel. Multiple parts of the bench were broken or damaged, and thus this monumental piece of garden furniture was in great need of a thorough restoration.

    What makes this garden bench so special is the lead relief on the seat back, with an depiction of dancing nymphs and satyrs. More on this later.

    I was asked to replace all parts in Bentheimer sandstone all of them. A very interesting job in which I can bring back the original crispness by carving it out of new material.

    Fruitguirlande sandstone Twickel

    I first started on the legs of the bench. The right bench leg has recieved a blow from the tree as well, and that shows in the fresh fracture in the left paw of the Sphinx/satyr and above in the corner. These are limestone garden ornaments, that around the eighties of the 19th century could be ordered from a catalog. Apparently not much has changed then!

    Sometimes it's difficult to define what exactly the depiction looked like in the past. The fruit garland is obvious; I've carved that kind of work before, among other things for the entrance of Castle Huis Bergh in ‘s-Heerenberg.

    But that reclining figure was unfamiliar to me. In a way it makes me think of an Assyrian Sphinx with its wavy goatee and the protruding front legs, but later I discovered the rams horns and it turned out to be more like a peculiar kind of little satyr.

    Whenever I'm copying these kinds of weathered pieces, I consider that in the course of almost 150 years the limestone has severely weathered down and sunken back. If I'd copy it in this state, you'll still end up with a copy of a damaged and weathered down relief. That's why I try to find out as much as possible how it once must have been. Sometimes that simply isn't possible because parts are gone and I have to interpret what used to be there. This reconstructing of damaged sculpture is one of the interesting aspects that make the work as fun and diverse. But luckily it wasn't too difficult this time: after all, there are two of these bench legs and what's missing on one of them, can sometimes be deducted on the other.

    Satyr in sandstone for bench castle Twickel / sandstone sphinxes
    Fruitguirlande and satyr bench for Castle Twickel / sandstone sphinxes

    Read more about the other elements of this garden bench

No more messages to show.

No more messages to show.