Willem Volkersz.com
About Us
Studio, Bozeman, Montana
The process
Each narrative (and often autobiographical) sculpture begins with choosing an image that will become the backdrop for the sculpture. For resources, I have a library of illustrations and coloring books and collections of slides and paint-by-number paintings. After an image has been selected, it is drawn in pencil and then painted on panels made of 1/4" birch plywood and clear redwood sides.
Next, I choose an image to be made in neon. I project the image and create a paper pattern which tube bender Bill Todd follows precisely. (Each pattern cites the required diameter of tubing to be used, as well as color.) The pattern for this sculpture was made from a photo taken on a trip I took to the Bay Area on my Cushman motor scooter when I was 17.
Bill Todd of Rainbow Signs in Bozeman, who bent my neon from 1987 to 2011, is seen here heating a section of glass tubing for the sculpture America the Beautiful.
Since Bill retired in 2011, John Nyman in Billings has been bending my neon.
After the tubes are bent, electrodes are welded on and the tubes are pumped with gas. Here the finished tubes are being tested in the shop.
When the neon tubes are finished, I drill holes in the surface of the work for the electrodes to pass through and then mount them. Finally, a transformer is installed inside one of the wooden suitcases (or behind a painted panel) and the electrodes are wired to the transformer.
