Oh, the work of Nemo Gould is so many things. Wonderful. Awesome. Imaginative. Out of the Box. Fun. Every good thing. His outlook relates very much to mine, and I love that, but it’s hard to see how anyone wouldn’t take joy in his work. Also, he has a thing for tentacled beings, what’s not to love? He even did work for the Monterey Aquarium!
Nemo Gould.
The Megalodon is Gould’s latest work, a 16-foot-long salvaged fuel tank from an F-94 bomber plane’s wing. The shark has working propellors for fins, and a tail that glides back and forth ominously. A cutaway on the side reveals various boiler and control rooms, each with their own delicately installed moving parts. It’s packed full of tiny human figures and whimsical creatures alike, all in mid-task as they operate their predatory underwater vessel.
The project took Gould a little over two years to finish. “I’d wanted to make a cutaway vessel for years, and had been putting objects aside for that purpose,” he explains. “I know it sounds backwards, but the tank was the last missing piece.” He found it at an aircraft salvage business, and from there he was able to assemble the final sculpture.
Gould says his process is a lot like solving a puzzle. “I maintain an extensive collection of things that I feel strongly about one way or another,” he says. “The challenge is to find which of the million potential relationships between these things could lead to the best art.” More so than his skills as an artist, machinist, fabricator, woodworker, et al., Gould says that “maintaining a vast, organized library of seemingly random objects is the real trick.”
Megalodon 2016 (extended) from Nemo Gould on Vimeo.
Just two more, and it’s killing me to not post all of them, and there are so many, so you’ll have to go visit!
Nemo Gould.
Cycloptopus is a fearsome hybrid of two of my favorite monsters, one real, one mythical. This creature is particularly dangerous because of its irritability. You’d be irritable too if you were powered by an open flame and your body was made of wood.
Materials:
Radio cabinets, rocking chairs, fake fireplace, decorative clock elements, cabinet knobs, wall paper, chair parts, lamp parts, wheel hub, motors, LEDs.
Nemo Gould.
I have been fascinated by the Giant Squid for quite some time. A real life, terrifying mystery of the deep.
I have posted a step-by-step essay of this piece with lots of process photos over at Instructables.com
Materials:
Street light covers, belt wheels, railing sections, brass fireplace hardware, candle sticks, drawer pulls, chandelier parts, wood planks, vanity mirror frame, timing motor, gear motor, LEDs, lawn sprinkler, pop rivets.
There are videos for most all the wondrous creations, showing them in their full glory and movement! Fair warning, you’ll be lost in Nemo’s world for a long time, but that is in no way a bad thing!
Oh, and don’t miss Octovarius! * Nemo Gould, Kinetic Sculpture from Found Materials. Go visit!
Via Make.
While they’re made of found materials, the works are quite “polished” and clearly a lot of work has gone into each of them. Very fine!
I’d love to see any of them in person! I spent a lot of time at his website, looking at all his creations.
His name is too perfect, very Vernian. His creations would fit into that world, too -- the attention to detail is amazing, but most of all I love the charm of the overall creation, they all have visible character, beautiful!