Austrian Tikis

Hi, my name is Alex "El Buho" from Graz/Austria. I create tikis from several materials since 2002 and this is one of my latest creations. It stands about 140cm tall (about 4 feet 5 inches) The photo was taken in the backyard of the house I live in. It would be nice to get some response.

Looks good, Alex! What is it made out of?

First, thanx a lot. Second, it's made of a porous concrete, finished with coloured tile-adhesive (is that the right word) and brown varnish.

Nice!

Do you cast it or shape it?

Well, the prototype is always shaped but sometimes I make a casting mould of latex and cast them in concrete. I used to do this with this moai-style head.

Thats a nice style to the Moai you did. Its got a swoop back look and I like the rough texture but the smooth looks like mable. Those will look just as good, if not better in a 100 years.

Hola "el buho"(the owl), nice work! Keep posting please! Greetings!!

Thanx for the nice words to all of you, I'm glad that you like my work.
@ Mr teaKEY, I prepare the concrete ones sometimes that it looks like granite too.

I also like the idea of colouring the concrete (as you can see)
Hola senorita clarita, greetings to Buenos Aires!

Very nice work....they would be a great addition to any garden. :tiki:

Excellent stuff El Buho, Sweet tiki.

This is a necklace I made for my girlfriend. It's made of leather, horn, wood and resin, it's about 75 cm long. There are four different tikis on the necklace.

Wow! Great work El Buho!
The Moais are my favorite-great personality on those! The four tikis on your girlie's necklace are very cool!!! Welcome to Tiki Central!

little lost tiki, thanx for your nice comment and also tankx for the salutation. It's a very special place here.

i love the tikis and i love the necklace keep up the good work

I dig your tikis. Nice work on the necklace too!

After weeks I found the time to post a pic of my Moai-keychain on my carkeys. It looks great swinging when you take the curves with speed...

The leg is mine, by the way.

[ Edited by: El Buho 2007-09-21 08:20 ]

My latest creation, it's called "Fünf Buama von weit her" (means "Five guys from far away"), acryl on canvas, burned wood. 120cm x 80cm.

Wow....that is very unique and absolutely beautiful. It is neat that you can work in so many mediums. Are these for your private collection, or do you sell them? Moai's are my favorite too. :)

Well, thank you very much, VampiressRN. Indeed I'll try to sell my stuff but here in Austria is no market for such things. Maybe this changes because of "Tiki Modern" which is now available in the bookstores here too.

Aloha, my friends!
I just finished this stuff, it's made of concrete and each piece is about 32cm x 34cm. This is the first design of a line I wanna make. I hope you like it!

[ Edited by: El Buho 2007-11-10 10:21 ]

Very nice work. If they can have a resturaunt in bavaria called "soup-a-tiki" that is still going after 2 years, then there is a market for your tiki stuff. you just need to start a EU tiki forum.

First, thank you for your nice words, that means much to me! It's funny that I get informed about Soup-A-Tiki across the Atlantic Ocean. This seems to be a nice little spot in Würzburg, I'll have to check it out soon.
Austria is still different to Germany and an EU forum would be just a secession from this forum. I think we all should stay together as one big happy family.
As my studio buddies and me open an art-shop this week near the Kunsthaus (Graz was European culture capital in 2003) the chance to sell my stuff will rise. But, money is not all and Tiki is Tiki and all, of course)

Thats a picture of the Kunsthaus in Graz!

Aloha Alex, hey what can I read here! You open an art-shop in Graz! Wow, why I don´t konw this.
You must tell me more and we can make a advance notice on forbidden-paradise.com (a place for european tiki interested peaple)!

Well Haikai, its not a big deal. Just 11 m² and only for four months. Tiki will be the smallest part in it, eight artists and everybody does something else. I'm the only Tiki-guy there.

That is some crazy building!!! I like your last tikis in concrete and the colors are delightful. I wish you well in the shop and I think you are correct in that BOT and TM is working hard worldwide to bring tiki to the forefront...which will be helpful for artists like you. Keep up the great work. :)

very cool keep up the good work they would be cool in any garden.the angryartist

@angryartist, thank you for your nice words. I'll try my best to keep on producin'...
@VampiressRN, the shop is open now, let's make some money :)
The building in the pic is a kind of museum for modern art and very famous now. It's also called "the friendly alien". It's also great inside, but the curators always have to have something extreme and thrilling in mind. It seems it's not so easy to make it good in this "rooms"...

A new model of a Tiki-Keychain by myself. I called it "Maomao"...

No penis this time...

Looks kind of angry...

My two latest Tikis, the first is about 120 cm the second one about 140 cm tall (somewhere around 4 feet to 4 feet 5 inches)
Both are shaped and prototypes

Finally I created my first Mug. I call this fine little guy "El Primitivo", it stands about 14 cm high and has a capacity of 40 cl of a tasteful strong drink I created for it that goes with the same name. It will be released in a limited edition of 25 pieces in grey, each one numbered.
Isn't that a fine start in a day?

Nice work. I like that idea of stone vs. wood, and the weathering should improve the sculpture with age.

Good job, send more pics.

On 2009-03-03 00:59, El Buho wrote:
Finally I created my first Mug. I call this fine little guy "El Primitivo", it stands about 14 cm high and has a capacity of 40 cl of a tasteful strong drink I created for it that goes with the same name. It will be released in a limited edition of 25 pieces in grey, each one numbered.
Isn't that a fine start in a day?

hmmm.. where did you get that idea?it looks very similar to this mug grog posted last year.. maybe sum influence ?

[ Edited by: kirby 2009-03-03 08:28 ]

El Buho, the mug looks good man. The bone in the nose reminds me of the rare and not often seen cannibal mug by spurlin(?). Hope this is the first of many mugs to come. Please in the future post progress shots of your mug creations as well.

Well kirby, I really have to say, I never saw the Mug by grog before in my life. But I sure like the structure of it, a very beautiful piece. Anyway, the idea of a primitve Moai with a big tooth is not that unpopular, I guess.
Kind regards

A big underbite with a tooth sticking up (like a bulldog) is a pretty common cartoony way of making something look primitive or thuggish. You didn't step on any toes El Buho, so sell 'em all you want. It not bother GROG. That we came up with a similar idea of a primitive Moai, just goes to show great minds think alike, or fools never differ----whichever the case may be. But, thanks for watching GROG' back anyways Kirby.

Well, Grog, I would say this is just another evidence of the theory of Polygenesis, people in different places have the same ideas as the human mind is similar.
Anyway, as I said, I absoluetely love the structure of the surface of yours. Kind regards from Graz.

Hi dude...Just to say nice good working you doin..
I only think you should put the pics of the many work steps.
So we get how you do it, maybe we could try it some day ;D.
Cya soon