Can tradespeople be artists? Lets ask Johnny Clasper.

Stone mosaic by Johnny Clasper

Can tradespeople be artists?
An interesting question which is being explored by a new Irish series on TG4 at the moment called 'Dullamullóg'

Launched last Sunday 13th January, the show follows six tradespeople who take on the challenge of creating a piece of critically acclaimed art.

Each tradesperson is paired up with a professional artist who helps them with their work. The final piece is then put in amongst professional art works which are all scrutinised by art critic Ciaran Bennett who then has to decide which piece is made by the tradesperson.

Art Critic Ciaran Bennet

The show features renowned Irish artists Cliodna Cussen, Peadar Lamb and Turner nominated Liam de Frinse. The first episode follows Eamonn O'Neill, a Tree Surgeon from Shankill, Co. Dublin paired with professional sculptor Séighean Ó'Draoi.

Episode two pairs plasterer and bricky Gearóid Ó Ceannabhái, from Dublin, with the great Irish stone sculptor Cliodna Cussen.

Bricky Gearoid on the show.

An interesting show, worth checking out. Screens at 8.30pm on TG4. Repeated the following Tuesday at 11.30pm. The series will run for six weeks. Can also be played back on the TG4 website watch it here.
I will look forward to seeing the next episode. 


This show reminded me of a great tradesperson cum stone artist that I have been meaning to highlight for a while now.
This person being Johnny Clasper.

Artist Johnny Clasper sitting on front of one of his flowing stonework art pieces.

Before becoming obsessed with stone, Johnny started off as a bricky. In fact from an early age his weekends were spent working with his father (a builder) as a labourer on building sites. Johnny quickly got promoted from broom and wheelbarrow to trowel and hammer. Johnny said that something happened when he was handed that rusty old trowel and heavy split handled lump hammer in his hands, a magic feeling inside. "With these tools I can build (a feeling I still get today when I pick up certain tools). A short while after I saved up and bought myself some decent tools. I was one proud 16 year old lad!"

Detail from another stone mosaic by Jonny Clasper

A fast learner and keen to learn anything he could, Johnny put himself into college to study brickwork "At last something I really wanted to learn and really enjoyed doing".
Johnny became top of the class and earned the student of the year award 1997. "College taught me all about the modern ways of building while my time at work I learned many traditional techniques of laying stone, at the time I was always drawn to stone.. so many ways to lay it as opposed to bricks."

Stunning stone wall by Johnny Clasper. I do love this wall.

The next 5 years or so Johnny worked on many stone houses, extensions and barn conversions before going self employed. Years passed doing the same things, that is until he started to read up and practice drystone walling. 

"This changed everything, without the mortar separating the stone, i became more in-tune and aware of the stone, studying the grain, natural shape and textures, different results and finishes were possible, everything was now falling into place or was it?

it was always my dream and goal to build something that hadn't been done before, but everything seemed to have already been done by someone..

I had thoughts of somehow bringing stone to life but how?

a wall will always be a wall or will it?"

Drystone sculpture 'the seed' by Johnny Clasper

In 2010 Johnny decided to rent a small studio where he hoped to create something that wasn't bound by the rules of building or drystone walling “both seem to contradict each other”

He started by making a seed sculpture with leftover roof slate, the pinnacle moment and the start of his creative journey.

“But the seed sculpture wasn't quite what I had in mind” explains Johnny. “I wanted movement in the stone somehow”.

Johnny's stone scorpion sculpture

"I had an image of an attacking scorpion in my mind made with jagged stacked slate and polished black limestone, materials I had kept from previous jobs.

against all advice from my sculptor friends, family and my own instinct telling me not to do it, I decided to create the scorpion (or the illusion I saw in my mind)

the scorpion was an instant success and the door to my creative part of my mind blew wide open!"

Dry stone stream by Johnny Clasper

From here Johnny started experimenting with flow. “If stone can be brought to life maybe it could become fluidic and flow like water would?”.

"Any chance I got I would arrange pebbles or shards of slate into flowing patterns or drains, mimicking the flow of water spiralling away."

Johnny's swirly pebble path in the gold winning garden at the 2012 Harrogate Spring Flower Show  

Last year Johnny was involved in the construction of a gold awarded show garden at the 2012 Harrogate Spring Flower Show. Part of Johnny’s design brief was to lay a stone slab and pebble path. Most people, if not pretty much everybody else would have been content with pebbles neatly spread between the flagstones. But Johnny being Johnny felt compelled to spend what should have been a five minute job into a nine hour labour of love, transforming what (in my opinion) was otherwise a nice ordinary show garden into an extraordinary gold winning one.    

Johnny's wishing well

Johnny has lots more great work on his website www.johnnyclasper.co.uk  but he is also a great man for the facebook so be sure to give his facebook page a like and keep up to date with all his work. 

More flowing pebbles by Johnny Clasper

Can tradespeople be artists? Hell yeah!

The amazing flowing stonework of Michael Eckerman

Safebreak Wave Wall, Santa Cruz Mountains

It’s not very difficult to see why Michael Eckerman and his stonework is loved by the surfing community, building stone features for many of the great surfers, and even getting featured in The Surfer's Journal back in 2007.

Bored with traditional stonework, Micheal’s creative nature has led him away from traditional design. Attracted by the flowing aspects of tectonic upheavals of lava flows that he observed in his travels, he began forming his own signature style of stonework, a style heavily influenced by these lava flows, as well as the movement of wind and water. 

Safebreak Wave Wall, Santa Cruz Mountains

Hailing from Santa Cruz, California, Michael Eckerman has been forming his own signature style of stonework since the 1970’s.

Forty years of building with stone has allowed him to expand his imagination and develop the free flowing type of stonework that he is known for today.

Michael Eckerman

 Like many ‘stonies’ Michael isn’t quite sure how he got into stonemasonry. There was no apprenticeship as such, although he learned much about what makes stonework strong and the principles of structural integrity while collaborating with an influential  builder from the ’60s and ’70s, called Ken Kern. 

He also recalls one of his first building ventures being a cabin he built with a friend in Quebec back in 69.

Even from the magical entrance to Michael’s home (a fantastic combination of stone and driftwood that seems to flow so naturally and playfully), it is clear that this is a home that lives and breathes art. And not only by Michael’s hand, for here creativity is a family business. Micheal’s wife Karen is an arborist, while his younger son Wes explores his creativity through photography and his older son Ea Eckerman expresses his creativity through both graphic art as well as sculpture. 

Pine Arch with Drift Wood

 

In the article by The Surfer's Journal, Michael tells a bit about the creative process of his work.

M. Eckerman beside his piece ‘Ledbury Tree’

"Each project is different, but the forms come through with a similar telegraphing message: flowing harmony. The stone suggests its form, he says. There’s not a lot of planning in his projects, no detailed drawings, maybe some chalk lines sketched on a wall. A flagstone forms a bench in a barrel. A helix has two platforms on opposite sides of the spiral—one for you, another for your sweetie.

The rock calls for touch. Natural, somehow, that stone should represent water. There’s good workmanship in all of it too: steps built to code, walls built to stand for centuries, ascending fireplaces around which the houses rise. Michael works with materials from the region he’s building in, whether it’s granite in the Sierra or lava rock in Hawaii. “If you knock it around in the surf for a thousand years,” he says of lava rock, “it gets interesting—very smooth, blue in color.”" [From article 'Natural Fit' in The Surfers Journal 2007]

Lebury Arch

In addition to stone, Michael accents much of his work with other materials, like brick, tile, glass, ceramics and metal.

Ceramic & Stone arch wall

Those of you who read my blog regularly will know my passion for creating stone benches. Well, Michael too has built some stone benches, but probably not in the way to which you may be accustomed. Check out this art project he did for the city of Menlo Park, California. Titled ‘Convertibles’

Convertibles

Micheal is currently working on a series of stone dog sculptures. It is interesting to see him use these same flowing stonemasonry techniques in a new more miniature and intricate way.  

Valcor- stone dog w:stacked driftwood

Guard Dog

 Michael has a vast and fantastic portfolio of work, so I suggest you check out his website www.eckermanstudios.com/ if you would like to see more. I have not even mentioned his absolutely stunning fireplaces and chimney stacks, so impressive in fact that they justify a blog post of their very own, which I will post later on in the year.  

Safebreak Wave Wall, Santa Cruz Mountains

 A big thanks to Michael for taking the time to send me the photos and information for this post. If you are interested in seeing the the article 'Natural Fit' from The Surfers Journal, you can purchase a download-able copy of the article from their website here 

Sources 

2010 Artist Bio written by Michael's daughter Rosie.

http://www.eckermanstudios.com/

The Surfers Journal 2007 article 'Natural Fit'