John McKinnon's Ice Sculpture Goes Up In Flames
By Bill Metcalfe
One of Nelson sculptor John McKinnon’s creations was destroyed by fire recently. But the flames were part of the piece. His Fire and Ice Tower was part of the High on Ice Festival in Fort St. John earlier this month. McKinnon and the rest of the West Kootenay ice-carving team (Denis Kleine, David Ducharme, Peter Vogelaar) carved an ice tower with a stack of firewood inside, then set it alight.
Ice and snow carving are part of McKinnon’s annual artistic calendar— he travels to competitions in North America and Europe every winter.
“This is the fourth year we have done this fire tower, says McKinnon. “This year we added some gargoyles to add another dimension to it.”
Like carving glass
Like any other artistic medium, ice has its unique properties and challenges. “I like ice because it clean and crisp. It’s like carving glass, it falls to the ground and it rattles like glass,” says McKinnon.
The temperature in Fort St. John was minus 35. “The ice is brittle at that temperature, it’s really hard. It cracks really easily. I could just tap a block and it might crack right in half.”
Optimum temperature: minus 12
“Ice is a very temperamental medium,” says McKinnon. “You cut the pieces so they fit together and then you squirt water to freeze it, but water at that temperature is difficult to work with too. And in the warmer temperatures the ice gets really sluggish. The first few days up there in Fort St. John it was above zero, and the ice gets really sticky. The optimum temperature is about minus 12.”
In Fort St. John this year McKinnon and Denis Kleine achieved third place in a professional carvers’ competition for their abstract piece A Gusty Day in the Park.
A Nelson fixture
McKinnon was born in Nelson and has worked as a sculptor all his life. He is perhaps best known in Nelson for his large pieces in Lakeside and Gyro Parks.
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