Victoria's Reviews of 5 Masterpieces from the September UWA 3D Challenge

The September UWA 3D Challenge Submission period is nearing an end. Over 40 artists have submitted their work. There are even some mesh pieces and I was fortunate to have been using a mesh compatible viewer so I could view them (I am using Phoenix Firestorm Beta Mesh V3, by the way).

But first, I want to take a moment to acknowledge a piece dedicated to 9/11. It has now been 10 years since that fateful, woeful day. The world will never forget it. CHUCKMATRIX Clip submitted a piece he calls "You remember exactly where you were..."

I do remember where I was when it happened. I was in school in Economics class.

CHUCKMATRIX currently lives in New York. At the time, he was walking back to his dormitory after getting out of a morning class when he heard about the crashes. He was attending RIT in Rochester, NY.

This was a very personal build to CHUCKMATRIX, since he knew a number of people who were there and who were affected by this terrible catastrophe. "Being from NJ I know many people who were affected by 9/11. One Uncle was supposed to be at the WTC that day for a meeting and by sheer luck the meeting was moved last minute. A second Uncle was on one of the fire crews that was sent to NY to help. And a third Uncle was a triage nurse at one of the hospitals where victims were sent. And a man from my church worked across the street and watched as people jumped from the building to escape the flame. He was never the same again."

He chose to only build the towers with the fire particle effect because he says, "When 90% of America turned on their TV's that morning the first thing they saw was the towers in flames. The footage of the planes slamming into the buildings came later, as did the towers falling. The first thing many people saw that morning was an icon of American power and wealth in flames."

September 11th has affected us all, whether we knew people who died or lost loved ones that day or not. We will always remember and yes we probably all "remember exactly" where we were that day.

And now I'll talk about mesh....

I bet you're curious about the mesh pieces, so I've chosen to review 2 mesh works that I noticed. The first is by mcarp Mavendorf, meshclock3. FreeWee posted pictures of it when she explains about mesh here.




Mesh clock 3 by mcarp Mavendorf

 Pretty cool, right? And this is just part of mcarp's original mesh clock. I got to meet him one night and he showed me the original clock, which he couldn't submit because it exceeded the mesh limit. He also showed me his other clock builds. Mcarp has built over 20 clocks in SL: analog, binary, big clocks, small clocks, a cuckoo clock....and they all come with sound. Mcarp even has a clock in the front garden of the Clock Museum.

Yes, the clock is backless. Why? Mcarp says "to celebrate the machinery". Having seen much of mcarp's clocks I can understand that statement. There are so many gears in a clock and they're always moving and making the clock run smoothly. And in SL, those gears will always work unless you change the script or lag affects the script so that the object won't run properly.

Please do cam to the back, I've always been fascinated by the gears in a clock as well. This is an intriguing, sophisticated, and well-sculpted mesh build.

The next mesh build I examined was Pumpkin Tripsa's Water. This one is a white marble sculpture.
 

Water by Pumpkin Tripsa

 What struck me about this sculpture is the position of the woman's body. To me it is evocative, erotic, sensual. and there is a sense of desperation about it. I sent Pumpkin some questions by notecard and below is what he said:

      It (water) ends up being a little higher prim than a sculpt would be, but the texturing and smoothness are well worth it.
      Water was inspired by some conversations I had with ClairLune Magic about the Linden Water with Windlight we're all surrounded by.  She has a very strong admiration for it and I think it's with good reason.  She mentioned a water nymph bronze piece in Pittsburgh that she thought would be great to bring in to SL. 
   
     I used the general pose of that piece and added my own interpretations.  I think water (the liquid) has a softness and fluidity that are very much analagous to the movements and grace of the female figure.  I tried to talk about this in the sculpture by creating something of a synergy between the water of the base and the figure itself.

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I truly felt that this piece showed the grace and beauty of the female physique. I believe that everyone has their own natural element like earth, fire, water, and air. For me, I think my element is water. And 98% of our body consists of water. This piece really speaks to me about feeling the oneness between body and nature or in this case....oneness with water.

Going to an out-of-this-world build now, we have Razorz's Space Elevator.



Space Elevator by RazorZ



Try to sit in one of the chairs, but just remember to turn off your AO or you won't sit right in the chair. The elevator has avatar radar so it knows who is in range of it. Once you sit in one of the two chairs, you can see up top of the screen that there are four timezones: SLT, New York, Dublin, and Tokyo.

Behind the pilot and co-pilot seats is another sit. Click to sit and press the picture of the little man above your head and you should get a menu from which you can choose a height that you want to go like 4000m or even EARTH.

I was intrigued by this build. It was very detailed and I thought the control panel looked awesome. I asked him what inspired him to build the Space Elevator and he says,

      The inspiration to build my Space Elevator was partly from to rules at a building contest & also from the great Sci-Fi & metal textures from my Organizer.  The rules of the build contest were, the build had to be 5m x 5m, but could be any height!  & no more than 50 prims!   This immediately got me thinking of an Elevator.  As this box shape is typical of any elevator lift & shaft in real world.   & thinking up & down,  any height, lead the train of thought in that direction. So I first made the nice fan you see at the back of the base/control room & its metallic  textures set the tone for the rest of the construction.

So what's the meaning behind his build? He definitely looks at it more as a piece of art than a gadget now.

     As for meaning (referring to the Space Elevator as 1 whole piece of art!), depth & substance, the whole build represents our ability, desire & need to progress, move up, rise.   Strive beyond what we have & the levels we become normalized to!  Phrases like;  ' Reach for the stars ' & ' Moving on up in the world ' ....  spring to mind.!?...  All done in a futuristic style, representing our ability & nature to look to the future & drive to take us to new places & heights..  RL & SL.  Also, our current real life evolutionary state where we are actually exploring the Star, Space & other planets.  And a race is on between scientists throughout the world to make a real life Space Elevator, tethered to a Space Station or the Moon etc..
Following that chain of thoughts & ideas, it will take more meaning to you & make it more enjoyable.

To see more of his work, visit the LEA art sandbox where he has 2 fractal pieces. His work Fractal Jungle is also up for viewing at the UWA submission area.

RazorZ is even working on getting this build on marketplace. If you have time, look him up at marketplace! I know I will, I am curious to see what other builds he has put up for sale there.

Next, a build of fractals caught my eye,  Foxfurneb Crystal Cube by Elize Foxclaw.





Foxfurneb Crystal Cube by Elize Foxclaw

 
It's a colorful, 25 prim build. I think it looks unique and majestic. Look closely and you'll see stars....very celestial wouldn't you say? Or are they stardust? You decide.

I asked Elize about her work and  this is what she said:


        The image is very organic to me and my inspiration comes from many things.  This piece it is based on the Foxfur Nebula and as you might gather from my surname, I like foxes.

       Fractuals are a mathmatical work that involves many things.  I am not sure I can explain why I build with them as I work on an intuitive level and let my imagination go wild.  I like creating the unusual.
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Unusual, yes but in a fantastical good way. She has plans to set up a new gallery in SL soon. Ask her for the location sometime soon, if you would like to see more of her work. She also has a few other builds on display too.

Thanks to all who submitted this month! You rock! I was greatly impressed by all the displays and I wish I could've renewed all the pieces! You artists are amazing! Thank you for all that you do and if you ever want to talk to me about your art, IM me inworld or send me a notecard. I also write for a few inworld publications.
After this month's round, there will be no further challenge rounds. Don't worry though, I'll still be blogging about UWA. Also, I'll start blogging about LEA. I am quite excited about that! One lucky artist gets to have their work featured on the LEA sim....how great is that! October's feature should be colorful, red hot and grand...a depiction of Dante's Inferno by Rebeca Bashley. Interviews will be forthcoming.