ArTree: Behind The Scenes

In April 2013, Visual Sanctuary was contacted by Vineyard Columbus's ECO: Creation Care ministry. They do a lot work in recycling and creating community gardens to get fresh produce to local pantries. We were contacted because we have a creative agenda to use our art serve the church and the community.

We worked them back in 2008 for a similar purpose. We used a truck load of boxes and assorted things to create a Recycled City. It was a blast and we had a number of child participants.

We had an interesting proposition: If you could build anything out of recycled material and it had to compliment or be a display for Earth Day, what would you build?

The sky was the limit, but we were limited by an unknown category of materials. This would be either an artist's dream or nightmare.

I decided that the best possible approach to this challenge was to treat it as an exercise in collaboration. This is a skill that all artists need to learn and it is also character building. It was a 2 for 1 deal.

Where do you start and what do you build?

On a Saturday afternoon, after pining over the project for some days I went for a walk and returned to find Samurai Jack on the movie shelf at home. Samurai Jack is a Cartoon Network favorite. This over-simplified cartooning style embraces different cultures and scenarios familiar to myth, science fiction, and fantasy. I studied the trees.

Prior to this I had thought a tree might be appropriate. Our logo is a tree form after all and it connected to the spiritual message in the Bible. It is also apt for Earth Day.

How do you build an ArTree?

We were flying blind. I invited the ministry leader to a meeting just so that we could discuss the logistics. Obviously, we had certain materials we wanted, but I rarely work 3-D. Joseph, who is a jack-of-all trades has a resume including maintenance, car repair, and video. He was the one who challenged me to refine my sketch so that he could build a framework out of wood.

Sketch 1

 The original concept as I had refined it for promotion.

Sketch 2

 The medium size sketch. It is cleaner and looks rather Industrial design.

Sketch 3

The size comparison drawing. It was drawn on a very large piece of paper. Note the stretched arm for comparison.

Joseph's schematic

Joseph built the whole skeleton. He took my medium size sketch and a piece of tracing paper to lay out the architecture of the frame. We used an old wooden skid for the foundation. How cool is that?

Random building materials

As he worked on the skeleton we took stock of our supplies and a small sampling of the recycled products we had.

Adhesives and Misc. we used

We were three of five meetings into the process when we finally made a decision about how we were going to utilize the materials. Our first attempt at building out from the middle did not prove effective. We had to move this behemoth to the dance room, where we could spread out and build higher.

ArTree Skeleton photo by R. Dave L.

Once the skeleton was finished I had to choose an off day and get it to the bookstore, so that we could finish it. The egg carton skeleton was dismantled after our supplies were left in the dance room and returned to the art room. It was not a cool move, but it proved that the structure was unstable and therefore we had to try something else.  Upon request of the bookstore we added wheels and took our masterpiece from about 10 feet to probably 7. It's just what you have to do in commissioned work some times.

For the final stretch of finishing the project we did whatever it took to get it done. Instead of using just one kind of adhesive, we used all that we had.

• A hot glue gun/superglue- For paper and slick cardboard
• Elmer's glue- On the paper to plastic
• Staples- Paper to plastic
• Screw and power screw driver- Anything attached to wood
• Packaging tape- Plastic to plastic, bottles, jugs, etc...

The shaggy leaves were made of newspaper, magazines, and ads and were cut with the scissors pictured above.

We used mostly commercial boxes to create our bark. We used the following, but were not limited to just them. There were cereal boxes, egg cartons, pizza boxes, and cracker boxes.

ArTree photo by Matt V.

All-in-all this a lot of work for 4 people and occasional helpers, even in 5 weeks. If you choose to do this or something similar, see if you can get a dozen or more. Getting kids ages 8 and up is ideal, just make sure you have a plan to include them. The night we had some kids participate, we had them help organize the supplies and help build the middle. You may be done in one night if organized correctly.

When we finished, we felt a sense of accomplishment. We celebrated with a pizza party. Collaborating is a fun way to learn and grow creatively. I'd encourage this on a regular basis, even if it is not as epic as the ArTree. You will bless each other and God will use you to bless others as well.

Because building a collaborative ArTree is fun.