Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves (part 2) -sand sculpture

This is part 2 of the sculpture work I did in Kuwait as part of the 2014 '1001 Arabian nights sand sculpture exhibition' In part 1 (linked at the bottom of the page) I showed a sculpture I made based on the 'forty thieves' story where they are (spoiler alert!) all killed. In this post I would like to show you the other piece which I created along with fellow sculptors Fergus Mulvany and Kirk Rademaker.

We were asked to create the cave from the same story where the thieves keep their treasure and which Ali Baba gains access to with the magical words 'Open Sesame'. This sculpture/installation was to be in a tented structure that would have controlled lighting and smoke machines to add atmosphere. It was a great project to be given and the three of us put our heads together to see what we could create with our different styles working together as one.

We decided to make it as a crystal cave rather than a rock one and design everything as just facets with straight surfaces and edges. We then mixed up our working areas so that our styles of crystals would be mixed.

In the story Ali Baba's brother Cassim is murdered by the thieves when they catch him in the cave. They then cut up his body and leave it in the cave as a warning to anyone else who would rob them. Ali Baba finds this and stick him back together so he can bury his brother and pretend he died of natural causes so that there would be no connection to him for the robbery of the robbers. For the full gruesome story there is a link at the bottom of this page.

I had great fun making all the dismembered body parts around the cave and thought it was so interesting that our sculptures had to be so censored in some ways due to Kuwait being an Islamic country but there was no problem in me making dead body parts. Religion can create a strange skew in morals. We also used sand coins which were made as separate elements and dried in the sun to add lots of riches.

Not having to worry about rain hitting our sculpture it allowed us to go a bit crazy with all the detail and textures. I collected lots of clay which had dried out and cracked from the tops of puddles after the heavy rain we had and used it on the floor of the cave to give even more detail.

I made an Ali Baba character filling a bag with coins to give the cave a focal point, being careful not the give him eyes as that kind of detail in our figures was not allowed due to religious reasons.

I also gave a little nod to Bitcoin, as it was something which I had just heard of and was telling everyone who would listen that it was the future and we should all be paid in it for our work. I think the price at the time was around $200. Little did I know that most of the work done in Kuwait would never be paid for.

We were very lucky to be given the creative freedom to Make the cave in whatever way we saw fit, being told it just had to "wow". I think we achieved this. It was like the three of us were in a jamming session each adding different spices to the mix to make one overall experience for the viewer who steps into the space. I never got to see the finally look of the cave with the lightings and smoke but I was very happy to get these photos as the sun set over the desert.

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Ps

For those interested in the great bedtime story of Ali Baba check out Wikipedia for a synopsis

All images are Clickable so you to see the original photos hosted on Flickr.

For Part 1 of this post click on this little tumbnail.

Ali Baba and the forty thieves (part 1)

and as always thanks for joining me as I re-explore my work in these blog posts.
@ammonite