All images © Todd Klein.

My friend Tim is visiting for a few days, and that means it’s sand sculpture time! You can see many of our past efforts at the Sand Sculpture category on the right column of this blog. We were at the beach Friday, Saturday and Sunday, and each did a sculpture each day. Above is my pyramid, with Tim’s rather indescribable piece in the background. Most of our sculptures the last few years have been inspired by the incredible ones of Calvin Seibert, examples HERE. 

Tim’s work has several abstract elements, and to me has a Steve Ditko feel. The hardest part is getting a smooth finish on the flat surfaces, which Tim is better at than me.

As the tide came in, Tim had to stop working on the cubes at bottom and he signed the top.

We were able to see the complete watery dissolution of our carvings on Friday, as high tide was before we left. The other two days we had to leave before that happened. Here it’s near the end.

On Saturday I made a sculpture with hexagonal towers, and added hemispheres created with a tool for that around the outside. I think this was more interesting than my Friday one, but I didn’t have the time or talent to get much of it finished smooth.

There were clouds some of the day, but the sun came out long enough for a few pictures. It’s hard to judge size from the photos, this was about three feet high. That’s about what you have time to do in four to six hours, depending on how complex it is.

Here are both Saturday sculptures.

Tim’s more finished work is like a pile of thick disks atop buttress-like legs. We don’t know what it is, but it seems like it wants to walk off like a spider.

Another view of Tim’s creation. The undercutting is tricky work, but Tim did well with it here.

Tim’s Sunday work included a very exact pyramid created with the help of wooden dowels that left a nice groove along the edges, and a small arch.

I call mine a crazy castle, with each level at a diagonal to the ones above and below, and the top layer is wider at the top than the bottom.

This is less abstract than the rest, but still very stylized. The crenellations are made from small cubes of sand cut and placed around the top edges.

This shot brings out the crazy angles, I think. I’m quite pleased with it.

Here’s another view of Tim’s work showing the textured area below the arch, a mix of dripped sand and cutting.

A better look at the pyramid. I tried using the dowels for my Friday pyramid, but couldn’t get it to work. Tim has more patience.

One final picture of my crazy castle from above. We had fun with these, but three days of sculpting is a lot, and we’re taking a rest day today. There may be more later in the week.