Post #562568 by Paipo on Sat, Oct 30, 2010 2:10 PM

Thanks Paul...believe me, I'm done with it. It's nothing but cool stuff from here on in.

I spent some time working on this post last night but TC went down just before I could pull the trigger. Let's try again....

Take 2 -
Here is some stuff I picked up some time ago but never got around to posting. This is the leftover stock from a souvenir business that closed down in Auckland...6 original carved wood masters and about 70 resins. The company was called "Bird Hill".

Here are the masters - I have no way to be sure these were all carved by the same artist, but it is very much in the institutional/Rotorua style according to my local whakairo expert. The guy who sold me the pieces had little to offer on their history. I also asked about the molds, but they had perished so he threw them all out.

Little ashtray:

Big ashtray:

Tekoteko...this is the only one that is signed - it has a little "jesus fish" on the base >

It is very tempting to remove him from his slab, but I kind of like the detritus of all the molds that have been taken from the carving.

Big Tuatara

About 12" long. See that pencil writing on the base board that says "Reduce to 220mm"?....

Little Tuatara...220mm long, and a pretty good replica of his big brother:

Last, but certainly not least - a Hei Tiki. The taratara a kae surface notching on this lil fella is mindblowingly tiny. I will probably take a mold from this at some point because I'd love to see one of these finished with paua eyes.

I have since disposed of many of the extras, and some have made their way to interesting locations:

I'd be keen to see examples of the resins I don't have (two ashtrays, hei tiki and lil tuatara) if anyone has found them in the wild....or any other "Bird Hill" products that are out there. I don't have any individual pics of the resins in the group and they are packed away right now, but if I dig them out I'll post 'em up.

I also have much more to share on the velvet I posted, but that will have to wait until I can access a scanner - I dropped my last one a couple of months ago. :(