Heather Wall has only been metal sculpting for two years since taking a welding course at Vancouver Island University. She worked for several years as a graphic designer with Parks Canada before finding her way to Powell River in 2011. For someone who thought welding would be a cool skill to know, Wall is being called a phenomenon within the specialized artistic fraternity that forges fire and metal. Her pieces, such as a recently commissioned humpback whale breaching, are receiving wide notice.
What have you discovered about the artistic process?
As an artist, I’m fascinated by how the brain works and how people come up with ideas. You want to be able to constantly generate that, so there has to be a science behind it. There is this certain type of mental stress you go through when solving a math problem or something you know is going to be difficult to focus on and, apparently, artists experience this all the time while they’re creating something.
Do you suffer from separation anxiety with your pieces?
I become deeply attached. I met a first nations fellow at the Castlegar Sculpturewalk and he did this wonderful ceremony to help with the anxiety of separating. Once he completed his ceremony he could walk away with confidence that his sculpture would be fine. You work on this stuff for months and then you just have to let it go. The best part is someone is going to appreciate and love it and it’s going to contribute to the community.
Where do you see yourself in 10 years?
I want to continue with public-space pieces, but I am currently working on a series of pieces that would live in a gallery. I want to get a body of work together before I start searching in bigger US cities, like Seattle, Los Angeles and New York, to sell that type of work. That’s a goal: gallery-space-type art pieces as well as public-space pieces.
What is it about metal that expresses your sense of art?
Metal has a certain passion. I think the passion with metal is the fire related to it. It’s very primal. You have to heat metal with fire to get it to bend to your whim. I’ve had this conversation with other metal artists and it’s dealing with blowtorches, plasma cutters and welders; that is a huge part of the metal passion. It’s almost like a brotherhood. We’re cultish about it.
For more information, go to hwallart.com.
