Aron Bothman

Overcast morning in Malibu near Leo Carrillo (at County Line Beach, Malibu) https://www.instagram.com/p/CqbwbQoPl_P/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

Hollywood Reservoir in gale-force winds with @ralphmpainters https://www.instagram.com/p/CqQ7hRPPt66/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

Bronze cast portrait of @augusterik excavated from its ceramic shell, #pinholecamera exposures on 120 film. #holga #bronzesculpture #bronzecasting https://www.instagram.com/p/Cn7jE7zPMeI/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

@sethery_beckerino as depicted in the early morning by the Pacific, i.e. his element. Cast in bronze with a ferric nitrate patina from a Chavant original. Happy birthday!*    *delayed on account of inclement weather     #bronzecasting #bronzesculpture #chavantclay (at Mesa Lane) https://www.instagram.com/p/CmuQ0s1PqJ7/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

The red-brown casting wax gets a coat of shellac before ceramic mold buildup starts, for reasons that aren’t totally clear to me but have something to do with increasing the adhesion of the slurry. Anyway I liked this angle with the lighting and the way the shellac gloss accentuated some of the sculpting marks, this is in the ceramic shell room before just before dipping. #bronzecasting https://www.instagram.com/p/CmFDxwzOTwF/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

Pinhole shoot from last week, wanted to try some photos of this sculpture before covering it with silicone for moldmaking. Shot on a Holga 120N camera modified with a .2mm pinhole on color slide film (Fujichrome Velvia 50). I thought I had miscalculated the aperture with the smaller pinhole and they’re probably a bit underexposed but I’m pretty happy with them, mainly the balance of bright shade, strong reflected light and dappled direct light. This is a portrait of @augusterik, my co-op roommate during my last year at Berkeley. I started this sculpture the winter right before Covid and have been chipping away at it in 2- or 3-hour increments during Bay Area visits since then. #pinholephotography #holga #velvia #fujichrome #portraitsculpture #chavant https://www.instagram.com/p/ClmUZFKyg5m/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

Pinhole photo of hollow wax casts awaiting gating and ceramic shell moldmaking. This exposure was around 15 minutes and the distance from the pinhole to the foreground cast was 2 or 3 inches. #ilfordpanf50 #holga #mediumformat #pinholephotography (at The Crucible) https://www.instagram.com/p/ClHPMt8Pch1/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

Patina tests on bronze at @the_crucible           #bronze  #bronzesculpture  #patina https://www.instagram.com/p/ClEvEe9SypB/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

Leo is the first dog I’ve ever spent a lot of time around, which happened mainly when my housemate was going into work throughout the pandemic and I was working from home. I started the sculpture in December of 2020 and have just been picking it up again over the last few days, with Leo headed out of town for the holiday season. Last two photos by @adevivo14 #chavant https://www.instagram.com/p/ClCopUav90p/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

The first round of sculptures I cast at @the_crucible. Clockwise from top: a plaster mask from a 7th grade art class, @_tall_black_weirdo_, my grandmother, @albertoplanet, and @jessicalin01’s housemate Spaghetti. #bronzesculpture #bronzecasting #foundry https://www.instagram.com/p/Ck_fkF9P7Bi/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

Portrait of my cousin. Bronze with dark brown undercoat + cupric nitrate patina #bronzesculpture https://www.instagram.com/p/Ck6X3oxvvhv/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

I shot a few rolls of process documentation with a pinhole camera, this is a portrait of my grandmother emerging from its ceramic shell mold. One interesting aspect of pinhole photography is that because there’s no lens, there’s no focal plane, so everything in the frame is equally focused (or equally slightly blurry, depending on the pinhole size). So in the first image the camera is something like 2 inches from the subject, which wouldn’t be anywhere near possible with the lenses I usually use, let alone with the background in focus. This is ISO 50 film, and given the warehouse lighting the exposure times here are in the range of 15 minutes (the .3mm pinhole is effectively f135). #holga #pinhole #bronzecasting #mediumformat https://www.instagram.com/p/CkwSdRfOcBu/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

After/before views, sandblasted bronze vs. ceramic mold buildup. #bronzecastingprocess https://www.instagram.com/p/Ckoe-GpumTv/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

Casting sculptures in bronze at The Crucible, an organization that does education around metalworking, glass, and other industrial arts in Oakland. @saharkhoury2010 and I are pouring liquid metal into ceramic shell molds, where a wax sculpture has been covered in ~8 layers of ceramic and sand to a thickness of around 1/4”. The whole thing is then heated in a kiln so that the ceramic fires and the wax melts out, leaving a hollow space for the liquid bronze to fill (hence the “lost wax process”). The ceramic is then broken away with a hammer and chisel to remove the solidified bronze sculpture. https://www.instagram.com/p/CkL_KcdPzmz/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

Morning streetview studies. One of the brighter spots of pandemic work-from-home on my last project was morning painting practice, where people from the design team would do a 30 or 40 minute Photoshop painting based on the same location from a Google Maps randomizer, while talking on an audio chat. Missing the team and the warm-up routine. In order, these are based on scenes from Latvia, Peru, Mexico, LA, Patagonia, Slovenia, Croatia, and I forget the last one https://www.instagram.com/p/CjYoq2YPaqW/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

One last one from France, the Rhône around sunset with @caroline.cherrier a little bit upstream from a beach area (at Lyon, France) https://www.instagram.com/p/Ci0wE3vv15R/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

Marseille