Waterjet-settingHarri AaltoContract Design - February, 1994 |
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Though Harri Aalto left Finland with his family at age five to settle in Toronto, he still counts his Finnish background as a significant influence on his artwork —particularly his interest In sculpting with natural materials, especially stone. "Finns have a natural bent towards three dimensional things." Aalto notes. A graduate of the Interior College of Art in Toronto, he spent a number of years drawing sculpting commissions from all over the world, and even counts ex-Philippine dictator Ferdinand Marcos among his clients. His art took an interesting twist in 1989, however, when he purchased a waterjet fabrication company in Fairfield. Iowa, and turned it into a high-tech sculpting studio called Creative Edge. His fascination with the technology, which can be used to cut and combine almost any materials with |
remarkable precision, is boundless. "Any artist knows the difference between a poor paint brush and a very fine paint brush," he explains. "Water-jet is a very fancy tool, and with it, what used to be clay or stone has suddenly become almost any material available to us. Nature is the artist's palette." Examples of Creative Edge's work include a 26 ft. x 18 ft. depiction of the Chicago skyline in granite, marble, limestone, stainless steel and brass for the Granite Marble World Trade Center in Chicago, and a 55 ft. x 25 ft. map of the world made of marble and stainless steel for Denver International Airport. Aalto calls his work "artistry in stone." And for those of you who are wondering- there's no relation. |
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Copyright © 2008 Harri Aalto/CEC. All rights reserved. Click on a flag below to translate the page. Be patient. It takes a few moments.
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