It took a while (two weeks) of thinking about my doll before I settled on who I wanted to create. The call in my head kept saying, 'kindly old gentleman that anyone would be happy to have as a grandpa'. The image was in my brain. It wanted to come out. When I finally sat down at my workbench the creative process began to flow. First came the armatures. Next came the covering of the armatures, then the detailing, then attaching the parts together into one form. Once the sculpting was finished and the doll was completely dry, it could be fired. The firing went well. The entire process flowed. My doll came together almost effortlessly. It was meant to be. So now we have in our midst, Grandpa Joe. He is a kindly fellow who makes me smile when I look at him. If I was a youngster, and he was my Grandpa, I could see myself sitting on his knee and listening to stories about his life. His gentle encouragement would inspire me to strive to achieve my dreams. There would be a lot of love in my life. Love that I would receive, and love that I would learn to give.

This form of silver that I use is called Precious Metal Clay (PMC). It's really not clay in the traditional sense that we know clay. It is silver mixed with an organic and water binder. This gives it the malleable consistency. If you think of mixing flour and water, what you get is malleable bread dough. This is the same idea. I form, shape, texture, and sculpt my pieces and let then dry. They are then fired in a kiln. During this firing process the organic material burns away, the metal particles bond and fuse together (called sintering), and what remains is the pure silver metal piece. There is a temperature range of 1110F to 1650F at which the PMC can be fired, and a time range from ten minutes to two hours. After the firing is complete the piece can be finished using any of a variety of metalworking finishing techniques.

While Grandpa Joe is not extremely fragile, a certain amount of care should be taken with him. The firing process hardens the fine silver so it is stronger than conventional sheet silver. However, if a strong enough force is put upon it, such as dropping it on the floor, or squeezing the arms hard enough, the silver will bend. If bent too much, or in trying to bend it back if it's been dropped, it possible that the silver could break.

I have thoroughly enjoyed bringing Grandpa Joe to life. Sculpting the human body is an aspect of art that I had not tried before. The torso, arms, and legs didn't appear very hard to do, but to sculpt the hands, feet, head and face seemed to me to be quite a daunting task. The face in particular was the biggest challenge. After all, this is what gives the sculpture its character and personality. To be able to successfully convey a personality through sculpture…..I've always admired that talent.