NAN 2022 Wrap-up - Halter

 Day 2 of NAN was a much slower pace for me than Day 1, but no less wonderful!

Azulito
Top Ten AR/OS Spanish Mustang/Other Pure/Part Spanish

Bella Nadell
Top Ten AR/OS American/Other Pure/Part/Grade Draft

Bert & Ernie congratulating each other
Top Ten CM Stock & Sport Foals

Mind Your Biscuits
Top Ten AR/OS Appaloosa Trad/Classic Mares/Geldings/Foals

 Workmanship 

Blonde Ambition
National Champion CM Warmblood
Top Ten CM Chestnut & Black Workmanship

Blonde Ambition
National Champion CM Warmblood
official glamour shot!

Ellie
Reserve National Champion AR/OS Light/Gaited/Spanish Foals
Top Ten AR/OS Other Dilutes Workmanship

Ellie
Reserve National Champion AR/OS Light/Gaited/Spanish Foals
official glamour shot!

Ernie
Top Ten CM Stock & Sport Foals
Top Ten CM Bay & Brown Workmanship

Jax
Top Ten AR/OS Light/Gaited/Spanish Foals

Kermit
Top Ten AR/OS British Native Pony

Mabel
Top Ten AR/OS Mule/Donkey/Exotic

Marah
Top Ten AR/OSArab/Part Arab Traditional
Top Ten AR/OS Bay Traditional Stallions Workmanship 

Molly Magoo
Top Ten CM Pure/Part/Mini/Light/Other Pony
Top Ten CM Gray & Roan Workmanship

Rebel Just for Kicks
Top Ten CM Paint

Rhinestone Romeo
Top Ten AR/OS QH Traditional
Top Ten AR/OS Gray Traditional Workmanship

Spanky
Reserve National Champion AR/OS Draft/Pony Foal

Zollie
National Champion Medallion Fantasy/Decorator/Unrealistic
Techincally, he showed on Day 3 in medallions and was proxy shown
for me (thank you again, Kate!) as I judged chinas on Thursday.

NAN 2022 Wrap-up - Performance

 

Loverly
National Champion AR/CM/OS Harness
I think the whip dipped and a rider slumped somewhere between judging and this picture!

 Wow! What a whirlwind. I'm just starting to catch up from last week. I was pleasantly surprised with how well I did at NAN in both performance and halter. I did a photo dump on my Facebook page, so be sure to check out the albums there for many, many more photos across all 3 days!

Loverly
Reserve National Champion AR/CM/OS English Trail

Loverly
Reserve National Champion AR/CM/OS Huntseat Pleasure

Mind Your Biscuits
Top Ten AR/CM/OS English Over Fences
This class was huge with many impressive entries!

Hollywood Bling
Top Ten AR/CM/OS Regalia/Other (including Parade)
Native American, Native Arabian, and Parade all showed together. It was a bit crazy the morning of day one,
so only one of my four entries made it in the class. Glad I went with this one!

Hollywood Bling
Top Ten AR/CM/OS Other Western (Western Sidesaddle Pleasure)

Hollywood Bling
Top Ten AR/CM/OS Other Performance
Scene Entry: "All the barn kids show up to get a kitten out of the tree"

Hollywood Bling
National Champion AR/CM/OS Western Trail

Blonde Ambition
National Champion AR/CM/OS Other English (Drag Hunting)

Blonde Ambition
National Champion AR/CM/OS English Trail
Beyond shocked to earn champ & reserve in English trail!

Blonde Ambition
Top Ten AR/CM/OS Huntseat Pleasure

Blonde Ambition
Top Ten AR/CM/OS English Over Fences
I started taking bushes away before I remembered to take a picture, lol

Mabel
Reserve National Champion AR/CM/OS Western Trail
I was blown away to earn champ & reserve in western trail as well!

Rhinestone Romeo
Top Ten AR/CM/OS Games

Rhinestone Romeo
Top Ten AR/CM/OS Other Western (Reining)

Sayaad Al Assad: Creation of NAN Donation 2008

Sayaad Al Assad

(Arabic for "The Lion Hunter")

This piece was originally intended for the 2007 auction, but I was unable to finish him in time. This is by far the most extensive custom I've ever created. He is basically an original sculpture over a whittled down resin armature. In 2008, he didn't meet his reserve at auction, so I did more work on his finish, adding subtle dapples and more warmth to his shading, which I think really helped to being this piece to completion. This was the last piece I offered as a donation to NAN. I realized that I just don't have the time to create a piece each year and give it the attention it deserves. The lack of photos showing his progress is evidence of how precious my time became throughout the process.

This year’s portrait is inspired by the painting, “The Lion Hunt”, by Horace Vernet in 183

I will be using a Centeno resin by Gudrun Schmidt to customize into the grey Arab in the front. It will be a more involved overhaul than the previous portraits, as I will have to do a lot of refining and resculpting to turn the original resin into an Arab type. 

His head has been whittled down considerably. Next step will be to soda glue the joints in place, attach his head with a thick wire to set his head and start sculpting. Additional dremeling will be needed to refine his legs, but I'll wait until he is standing and the new position is stabilized.

 Next he was pinned back together and dremelled down to an armature. I dremeled down all four legs to realign joints and refine the cannons. Then I sculpted him into his present form.

 Reserve Champion of Division, No Frills Live Show, Huntley, IL, Feb. 2009

Inky: Creation of NAN Donation 2005

Manchado de Tinta or "Inky" for the short English translation - Donation to NAN 2005 Auction

Manchado de Tinta (aka "Inky") is a custom portrait inspired by a historical painting by Johann Georg von Hamilton, the court animal painter of Emperor Charles VI. Countless hours went into transforming a Brigitte Eberl "Verocchio" sculpture into this historic Spanish Colonial Horse performing the Levade. He was meticulously hand painted with acrylics and pastels and sports one blue eye, delicate, shimmery bows, and even subtle shading on the white. Note that he does not require the use of the base, as he is perfectly balanced free-standing.

Repositioning has begun. I used the cutting and heating method to move parts. Some parts required being completely detached and pinned into their new position. Still need to tweak the angles of the legs so that they are in proper alignment. Right now the hocks are a little too close together, which was proper for the way the original sculpture was moving, but not for the levade. The forelegs were actually easier than I planned and I should have only minor shoulder work for their new position. The head had to be completely chopped off as the resin was solid and too hard to bend. This will create more work in rebuilding that area, with all the fine veining and wrinkling that were obliterated in the process. And the ears were removed so that they will both be back. They are refined enough, I may use the original ears with minor modifications rather than sculpting new ones from scratch. I guess we'll have to wait and see. He looks pretty frightening right now, so be sure to come back and see his progress!

Getting the alignment of all the parts was very time consuming, with much trial and correction. I had to remove the hock, pastern, elbow and knee joints on two legs either because the armature wire was in a place that did not allow me to work with the original structure or I did some drastic bending of those particular joints from the original position. I lopped off a good portion of the tail to raise the body angle, and this also helped to back-weight the piece so that it appears that I will be able to finish him free-standing. The pastern angles and hooves will have to be tweaked by sanding down and building up with epoxy as the armature wire was too stiff to bend any more in those short areas. I also cut off more of his neck at the poll to give me freedom to place the head where I needed it.

I used soda glue to secure the pins in their new position, which has great strength to hold while I assessed the new positioning. I found it fairly easy to work with when I needed to undo a section since I didn't build it up too thick during the trial stage. In one area I did overdo the soda glue and had to dremel it down to change the joint. I don't recommend dremeling soda glue or heating it up, it has terrible fumes. Lesson learned!

I have discovered that sculpture is really problem solving in three-dimensional form. As soon as you correct one part, another part begs looking after. And then there is the balance issue that calls for constant problem solving when working with that moving equine! One thing I tried this time was to use soda glue to adhere a series of washers to the base of the tail to create an armature of sorts. I was hoping it would add weight as well, but the epoxy was heavier than the washers I could find. I've been finishing his tail seemingly prematurely because I need the weight of the epoxy there so he doesn't tip over when I start working on the forehand. He's going to be one very heavy boy! I did put aluminum foil in the neck cavity before laying epoxy over the top to make some effort at keeping his forehand light. Here's hoping that the delicate balancing act of sculpting will end up with a steady horse in the end. Here's a couple more pictures with some sculpting work done.

 

Okay, some more work done. The alignment of the right hind leg was still bothering me, so I chopped it off at the stifle and slid the whole thing forward. Lots of rebuilding was done in that area. He is getting heavier and heavier with all the epoxy. Good news is that by moving that leg forward, he is completely stable on his tripod support now, the extra weight will just be padding I guess! Changes aren't very visible in the photos other than the creeping amount of epoxy covering his body.

Showing off his newly finished mane and pert, little ears. Sculpting is done!





And finally, the completed Manchado de Tinta. Although he came with a custom, landscaped base with tiny blue wildflowers, note that he does not require the use of the base, as he is perfectly balanced free-standing.