The following is some history and background into my garden art days. Very few of these pieces were made. If you have one, you have something very rare.
My initial vision for this project was to create old cars to decorate gardens. I have always been fascinated with how cool junk cars look and the character of the rust over time. Plus, as the stone ages in the weather, it produces a beautiful look that only mother nature can do.
The first project was, of course, the 1948 Tucker Car. I sculpted the car as large as possible out of clay. This was a giant first step coming from miniatures. I used basic tools and feel the piece came out pretty good all things considered. I made a mold and cast a few in concrete. You can see how time has placed a beautiful patina on the concrete.
Since that first project over seven years ago, I have learned much about what seems to be at first, an easy medium to work with. Anyone who has worked with concrete knows about the “weird science” behind this liquid stone. I have literally gone through hundreds of formulas and experiments. Plus I have had hundreds and maybe thousands of failures and rejects. At some point, I found the right mix and casting technique. Years of experiments and hard work has finally resulted in the rock-solid castings I get today. Below is a brief journey of my pursuit of stone.
The Tucker project was lots of fun but the first thing I realized was the weight would be a big problem for shipping. The Tucker casting weighed 25 pounds. So I decided to create cars a little smaller. Here are some samples. These are a couple of pounds each.
I then decided to broaden the subject matter and offer a wider range of products and styles.
After I sculpted, molded and cast about 50 different designs, I entered the Cleveland Home and Garden Show in 2009.
After the show, I experimented with some other colors and recipes for concrete.
One thing I learned from doing the Home and Garden Show is that weight was still a problem. Moving around a large number of sculptures was a lot of work. So I decided to try a different approach. This time I created a plaque that was thin and had two stainless steel rods in the bottom so you could just push the piece into the ground. The first designs were birds and marketed under the “American Gift Stone” name. You may have seen some of these in Wild Birds Stores.
The pieces could be displayed in the box that it came in.
After the American Gift Stone project, I tried to market some concrete sculptures for indoor use and for the gift ware market.
Taking this mouse theme further and incorporating them into the plaque idea,
I started working on a series of holiday and special occasion themes.
Above is an example of the “Angel Series” I made for loved ones to place at grave sites or in a flower garden.
Below is one of the mouse plaques converted to a ground stone.
My next idea was a line of motorcycle sculptures using colored concrete and iron oxides to accent. This project was called “Rusty Old Bikes.”
This developed into another finish using iron oxides.
I then changed the design so that the sculpture could be displayed in multiple ways, from self-standing, hang with a hook, or display outdoors.
The idea hit me to try a painted finish that resembled bronze.
I developed a display and went to some motorcycle swap shows.
Thank you for your interest in my art. The concrete sculptures are no longer available.
Randall Zadar
