After clients give their approval and Cheryl deems a piece “ finis ,” a moment of sheer panic is followed by an almost spiritual peace , and then the extreme detail work begins . Cheryl creates a mold of the finished piece , meticulously ensuring its accuracy . She then does the complicated math to garner an exact upscaled version of the piece and begins the entire process over utilizing larger materials for the structure than the basic wire used in the maquette — things like rebar and pipe to secure the weight of the piece . Then she begins the entire process again in exact detail , only to scale . Once she ’ s happy with the full-sized model , she hands the sculpture over to a trusted foundry that specializes in bronze sculpture . Cheryl has found a special partnership with Parks Bronze Foundry in Enterprise , Oregon .
She often travels with the sculpture , doing much of the detail work herself as the full-sized sculpture is dismantled into many pieces for bronzing . The “ Chief Morris Antelope ” sculpture measured 6.5 ’ x 4 ’ in his kneeling position and ended up being dismantled into 52 pieces that had to be meticulously worked and then reassembled to perfection . Cheryl shared , “ The full-sized Chief sculpt took me three months . The work at the foundry took five months with approximately 12 people touching it at one point or another to
March | April 2022 73