Diego Harris
steelsculpturesbydiegoharris.com
PO Box 511
Upper Lake CA 95485
707 350-4209
diegosharris@gmail.com
Artist Bio
Mr. Harris is an artist whose current focus is constructing larger than life, whimsical sculptures primarily made of welded steel, sheet metal, and recycled car parts that invite people to interact with them. More recently, Mr. Harris has begun to offer making his sculptures in Corten steel or Weathering steel as it is also known. Using weathering steel, a sculpture will last longer and require less maintenance than one made with traditional mild steel. This is because weathering steel has small amounts of copper, nickel and chromium. The sculpture will develop a rust patina but will not develop deep pitting rust. This eliminates the need for subsequent applications of weather sealant.
Mr. Harris was born in Baja California, to artist parents and then moved to Rancho Palos Verdes in Southern California at young age. Later, he along with his family moved again to Lake County California where he has lived ever since. He has experimented with many different mediums including wire jewelry, burned gourds, fine art photography, and painting, but found his true passion when he learned to weld in 2007. He is inspired by the amazing effortless shapes of perfect symmetry as well as perfect asymmetry in nature. His metal sculptures are constructed with exposed rivets, wide lap welds and excessively sturdy bolts. These elements add incredible strength to his structures and break up the curvature enough to give the viewer’s eye a chance to stop for a moment. He is fascinated with old industry and strives to find a perfect combination of organic contours while keeping his pieces balanced and anchored which ties it back to its creator, a human that lives in a structured society.
Mr. Harris has owned an art gallery in Upper Lake, CA for the past 17 years and has recently opened a new shop with his fiancé next to Judy’s Junction Restaurant in Upper Lake CA. Mr. Harris has also been involved with public art projects for the past 15 years. This has taught him how to get the best use of an outdoor space.
Q & A:
What is your creative process? Do you start with a sketch or completed design, or do your sculptures take form in a more freeform way?
I can work either way. I tend to already have a pretty set idea of what I’m going to make before I start but I do like to experiment sometimes and just sort of see what happens if I do something a bit different. Even in that case though I do still tend to have a rough picture of what I’m shooting for in my head. Sometimes however, I start with one thing in mind and then decide to chance it up a bit halfway through. Often times I will do a drawing before I start. I sometimes have to submit a drawing before starting a commissioned piece. It can actually be more difficult that way though because once you’ve submitted the drawing, you then have to pretty much stick to it and not deviate much from the design.
How do you actually build your larger sculptures? Do you have any specialized equipment that helps you with that?
My construction style is actually pretty simple. It’s mostly just a matter time and experience. I have a mig welder and a plasma cutter. I also have several different sizes of grinders that I use. Other than that though I mainly work with hand tools to form my sculptures. It’s a very methodical process that I’ve developed over the years through much trial and error. I start by making a structure of steel rebar. This is how I get my shapes in for the sculptures. It also adds a lot of strength because I add lots of cross members like an old fashioned trestle bridge. After that I trace out the shapes with packing paper and then transfer them to the sheets of corten steel with soap stone chalk. I cut everything out with a plasma cutter and then sand all the edges clean and smooth. I have to bend all the panels to roughly match the shapes, which I do by hand so as not to leave tooling marks on them. I clamp all the panels onto the structure and then seem weld everything. After welding, I sand all the edges smooth.
How did you learn to weld?
I took night classes at the Kelseyville High school through the Mendocino College. I did that for several years and tried to learn as much as I could about different welding techniques. After that I got a cheap little flux core wire welder and started messing around with scrap metals and such at home. A lot of what I do today I learned on my own through 15 years of trial and error.
Where do you find inspiration for your sculpture designs?
I take a lot of my inspiration from shapes and structures in nature. I particularly like spirals and have spent a lot of time trying to find ways to use them in my sculptures. I like the shapes of certain plants and tree branches too. It could be most anything though, I’m always trying to take in as much as I can from the natural world. I do also like a lot of designs from industrial architecture. I like old rusty stuff, old buildings, bridges, trains, cars and things of that nature. It probably not as big of an influence on my current work but you can still see some of it on my larger sculptures where I make large bolted flanges to attach parts together.
Are there any artist that you have been influenced by?
I do really enjoy looking at the works of other artists. I used to spend hours in the Library looking at all the pictures in art books and such. I particularly like the sculptures and mobiles made by Alexander Calder. I also really like the sculptures of Henry more and Barbara Hepworth. I try and stop at museums and art galleries when I have the chance. Some of my first influences though were probably from my parents Derek and Sherry Harris, who are both artists.