Today is Toshi Puppamoto’s 4th birthday! Please wish him happy birthday.🎉 And maybe buy some Bitcoin art so I can buy him more treats and toys. Any art sales today (most days really) will go towards the Toshi Treats & Toys Fund.

Progress update ⚒️🏃🏻‍♂️ Still working on the right arm and right hand but I jumped around a little and started fixing other areas like the left side where the shirt meets shorts. The curvature wasn’t quite right before. As I’ve said before, this is very much a learning process for me. I try to keep challenging myself and this carving is no different. The cool thing for me to see is the improvement of my understanding of relief carving just within the scope of this single project. The legs for example- they’re not done. I knew I wanted to go back and re carve them but now I have a much better sense of what I need to do after having worked on other parts. Relief is an interesting challenge. I still think I prefer carving in the round (think free standing sculpture), but I’m glad I’m learning how to do this. Stay tuned for more updates… I’m off to bed. Back at it tomorrow.

Hey bro, hold my chisel for sec. Need to post something silly on nostr. ⚒️🏃🏻‍♂️

Progress continues ⚒️🏃🏻‍♂️ Reworking the right hand a little bit now. I’d started in on some details but the perspective was off so now I’m pushing certain parts deeper. The positioning of this hand (and the blurriness in parts of the original photo) make it especially tricky. So right now I’m working to make the thumb appear further back than it really is, giving the palm more depth by pushing it further into the stone, making sure the various angles are correct. When I’m happy with all that, I’ll move on to adding details like lines in the palm, fingernails and creases/wrinkles etc. Once this hand is done… I’ll be moving on to the head. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t nervous about that, but also a little excited. If I can pull this off, it will represent a big step up in my abilities as a sculptor. Onwards…

Forgot to share the result… fun little test project I completed recently, a relief carving in green slate from Vermont with 24k gold leaf. I took inspiration from Japanese kin byobu (folding screens) with the idea being to possibly create larger works with multiple panels… What do you think?

Just putting this out there.. My local stone supplier has a 1014 lb block of orange calcite available. Anybody want to commission a monumental Bitcoin B? Just imagine it sitting by your pool and the sun making it glow as Bitcoin hits $1MM.☀️

Carving continues ⚒️🏃🏻‍♂️ Still working on Hal’s right hand but I have a good grasp on what needs doing to make it look right. I’ve also pulled his right arm deeper into the stone to add more depth as I work on the hand. The lighting you see here is interesting to note as it’s the angle I’m using to check my progress. Also approximately the same angle as the sun in the original photo of Hal. With any sculpture, but with relief in particular, lighting and the shadows created from that lighting are key.

I recently picked up an 80lb block of Carrara marble. 🏛️ I will be splitting it into ~8 smaller blocks and creating variations on the piece I carved for another Bitcoiner, below. Let me know in replies or DMs if you’re interested! 🤝

Back at it… ⚒️🏃🏻‍♂️ Currently working on the right hand and feeling like I’m a little more than halfway through this marathon. Once I finish this hand I’m going to move on to the shoes or the head. Maybe the shoes because they’ll be easier and carving hands makes my brain hurt. Once I “finish” everything, I’ll then need to go back and make adjustments and refinements. Still a lot left to do.

Done for today ⚒️🏃🏻‍♂️ Today I worked on the left arm and started defining the right arm, shoulder and hand. You’re seeing the panel after I’ve just done some light sanding of the background and washed the dust away with water. With a bright overhead light. Gives me a more accurate progress update. Back at it tomorrow.