ScrapFest 13 - Merging Frontiers 2023
Scrapfest started over 14 years ago in the little town of Old Town Lansing in Michigan. The owners of Friesland Industries Recycling have been the backbone of this incredible event. Let’s dive into this years ScrapFest event from a look through my eyes. This is my second year competing in the sculpture content but this year is a little different. This year I teamed up with my friends and fellow metal artist, Mike Beaver of Beaver Fab Lab. Mike has been creating amazing sculptures for years and when I was thinking of a team mate for this year, he was my first choice. I knew out styles were different enough to showcase each each of our styles but also close enough that we can work together to make one art piece. It all started with message. “Hey Mike, would you like to join me for this years ScrapFest?” With little to no hesitation I got a reply back “Yes” and that’s where it all started.
We spend the next few months coming up with an idea for a large sculpture. With a handful of ideas floating around we always resulted back to the things we like to make. Mike like making skulls and I like making robots. So we thought, why not combine the two. That’s where Team Skullbots “Merging Frontiers” was created. We spend many hours chatting of what we wanted to add and why it made sense with the sculpture. Before we knew it, we were getting our truck ready for the trip from Pittsburgh to Lansing for Collection Day.
Collection day is a scrap metal artists version of Chuck-E-Cheese, a playground where creativity comes to life. All the artists met at Friesland Industries scrap yard in Old Town Lansing, MI. There each artist has 1 hour to collect their material for a sculpture. Each artist is allowed to get up to 500 lbs in the large piece category and 250 lbs for the small piece category. We were in the large category. The buzzer went off and its was GO time, picking through parts, finding the right pieces to bring our idea of a sculpture to life. With what feels like a blink of an eye, it was over. we collected around 400 lbs. Each team is weighed and can’t be over weight. If they are they need to remove material from their bins until they are at the correct weight. After that we loaded up our truck with all the scrap metal and made out way back to Pittsburgh. Check out this video from Collection Day!
COLLECTION DAY VIDEO PART 1 OF 4
The Building process started as soon as got back. Mike took about half the materials back to his shop and I took mine back to my shop and we started building. This was an interesting process because we were each building had of a sculpture and relying on great communication and that’s exactly what happened. Even though we were in two different shops, we were able to share photos and dimensions and work together to take out two halves and bring them together. Each artist has 1 month to build their sculpture. And in the sculpture world, that’s not a lot of time to make an award winning sculpture. Just as the collection day went buy in a blink of an eye, the building process went by very fast. We put together a video of the build process so you can see what we started with, what we ended with and the finished sculpture.
THE BULD PRICESS VIDEO PART 2 OF 4
Artist Dropoff Day is where each artist drops off their sculpture. Every artist ,gets at a location in the Old Town Lansing, Mi area to drop off their art pieces. There they will be photographed and stored until the main event of ScrapFest. This is a really fun tie to reflect on all the hard work we did and enjoy seeing all the hard work all the other artists did. It’s also a time where just the artists can get together and connect on a more personal level. That was great to ask some of the processes some of the artists used, ask questions and just be around so many like-minded people. All there for the love of metal art. It was a Wonderfull time. Check out this video to get a glimpse of the artist drop-off experience.
ARTIST DROP OFF DAY VIDEO PAR 3 OF 4
ScrapFest 13 was held on July 14th & 15th on Turner St. in Old Town Lansing, Michigan. The event started on a Friday evening and just so happened to be the city’s art work (How Perfect) and the streets were packed with people. We talked to a bunch of people about our sculpture. Mike and I also had the opportunity to set up a vendor booth to sell some of our other metal art creations. The second day was also packed with people, artists, art lovers and everyone in-between. This year there were artists that participated in ScrapFest all the way from Texas, Illinois, us from Pittsburgh and more.. Who knows what next year will bring! The Main event went absolutely fantastic. It was so much fun and we met a lot of new people and saw some old friends. Check out this video I made of the ScrapFest main event
SCRAPFEST MAIN EVENT VIDEO PART 4 OF 4
What an amazing experience from start to finish. Id like to personally thank everyone from ScrapFest for all the hard work they put into an amazing competition and event. I know it is not an easy task and the attention to detail to make it all happen (and happen well) did not go unnoticed. I’m already looking forward to ScrapFest 14 and starting to think of some sculpture ideas.
We had nurmous support from other companies and people that helped us accomplish our sculpture and also help get the word out there about ScrapFest and TeamSkullBot. To name a few: Blue Demon Welding Products, Benchmark Abrasives, PGH Print Ship, WELDDotCom, I also wanted to say thank you to EDGE Welding Cups for allowing us to share our videos and experience through their YouTube channel swell as the continuous support. I also wanted to say thank you to Charity, Grandpa, Nicolette, Mike Bass, Heather Mossing, and Josh for everything.
Resources and Links
Mike Beaver / BeaverFabLab
ScrapFest Website
ScrapFest Sculptures Bidding Website
Friedland Industries Scrap Yard
City Of Old Town Lansing
EDGE Welding Cups
Blue Demon Welding Products
Benchmark Abrasives
WELD Dot Com
PGH Print Ship