I have been remiss in posting new work. This WIP for Baphomet is lengthy as it encompasses about 6 months of work.

In March 2021 I began to cast another PKKing sculpture “Baphomet” that I purchased in 2012. This is the second PKKing sculpture that I will cast in bronze. This work is much larger and more complex that the previous “Yan Wu” sculpture that I cast last year.

In March I started to take urethane rubber moulds of the large pieces that make up the base of this sculpture. I had a quite a bit of brush-on rubber remaining after making the moulds for Yan Wu and urethane rubber does last when opened to air. Rubber is expensive and I didn’t want to waste the material. The pictures below show the making of some of these multiple part moulds. Over 2.6 kg of rubber was used for the moulds for the base of Baphomet.

When the moulds were finished I filled them with wax. The wax was poured into the mould and swirled around to make a shell. About 500 grams of wax was used for the two parts of the base. When I am ready to cast these parts they will have to be cut into smaller pieces as I cannot fit the large parts into my casting flasks. I will also have to shave down the wax on the inside to eliminate material otherwise the base will take far too much bronze to cast.

Next, I started on the moulds for Baphomet’s body. This is another large part but this mould was designed to be injected with wax unlike the previous moulds that were designed for poured wax.

Baphomet’s body required 500 grams of wax. The part was much too big for my largest casting flask so both arms and the groin had to be removed. The remaining part of the body had to be hollowed out to leave just a shell of wax for casting. I was able to get the body down to 150 grams of wax which translates into a single pour of 1.5 kg of bronze. This amount of bronze is about the maximum amount of metal that I can melt and pour at any one time.

Once all the body parts were cast they had to be brazed or soldered back together. However, this whole piece contains a lot of metal and it takes a lot of heat to reach the 750 degree Centigrade temperature at which my bronze solder begins to flow. Both my large acetylene torch and my little jewellery ox-acetylene torch had to be simultaneously used to provide enough heat.

When Baphomet’s body was assembled he weighed 2.5 kilograms. The next step was to cast and assemble his legs and head. New moulds were made for the legs and the wax parts were created. Once again the legs were far too big for my casting flasks so the wax parts were cut in half and then hollowed out for casting.

At this time Baphomet is all together in bronze, except for his wings and tail.The sculpture currently weighs 3.8 kilograms. This is by far the biggest bronze sculpture that I have ever made.

The next posting will show the construction of Lilith, the girl on Baphomet’s shoulder.