Monday, October 30, 2017

Albert Paley & Jesse James

FABTECH 2017 will be coming to Chicago in a little over a week. There will be two sculptures on display that will be a result of a collaboration between Jesse James and Albert Paley. As I understand it, each will start a sculpture and then the other will finish it. I saw a teaser by Jesse James on Facebook about this awhile back but didn't find any details anywhere. I finally came across some more info in an e-mail I received from FMA explaining what was going on. They also have a series of short videos with James and Paley with a couple more to come. Most of the videos are two minutes or under in length - definitely worth watching.

I'm sure most everyone is familiar with Jesse James but Albert Paley is not exactly a household name - he should be, though. He's a tremendous craftsman/artist. I'll be attending FABTECH so I'll get a chance to see the finished sculptures before they're auctioned off. There's supposed to be a one hour documentary on the project later on. I'm looking forward to seeing that. James himself said it'll focus on the making without any of the drama that you normally see on the television shows. That's the type of thing that there should be more of.



Got the headlight bracket thing figured out - at least for now. After I get the motorbike mobile, I'll see how well it works like it is. If I like it - done. If not, back to the drawing board. I also got going on the pedal chain tensioner. So still moving forward on that project, which is a good thing.


School house bell is out in front of the house. The Missus and I had a little miscommunication as to where this thing was going to reside, so I'll have to move it but only a few feet. Actually, that's probably better because I'm going to have to do some landscaping work to get everything like she wants it. Depending on the weather, that might have to wait until springtime.

Went to the fights Saturday night. Jimmy was out of town so my running buddy, who's also a boxing coach, and I worked the corner for a couple of fighters from the gym. One guy fought pretty well but got clobbered with about 15 seconds left in the fight and went down. He got back up and his opponent tore into him again. I was just about ready to throw in the towel but the ring doctor got up to do the same thing. Both of us and the ref were all going to stop it about the time the bell rang, so technically, he lost a decision. Five seconds longer and it would have been a referee stop contest - RSC.

The other fighter of ours just stunk the place up. I'd never seen the kid fight before. If I had, I wouldn't have gotten him a fight until he got in better shape. He could easily have won the fight if he had a little stamina. Hell, he was damn near out of gas when I was warming him up. The kid's got talent, just needs to make the commitment.

2 comments:

Frankie Flood said...

Can't wait to hear about your trip to Fabtech. I remember hearing Paley speak as a visiting artist at the U of I. He's someone who I have respected for quite some time. He started his art career as a jeweler believe it or not.

Shop Teacher Bob said...

Quite the difference in scale between a jeweler and the type of smithing he does. I'm looking forward to seeing the sculptures as well as all of the welding and fabricating equipment. I'll be sure to post something about it.

You'll have to let me know of any classes you're going to be offering to the public. Now that I'll be retired, I'd like to travel a bit and sneak in a bit of education while I'm at it.