BREMERTON — Olympic College welding instructor Kevin Snell admits he isn’t much of an artist. But now, he’s an award-winning piece of art.
A team of OC welders took top honors Friday at an artistic welding competition in Bellingham, with the team of four students paying homage to their dedicated instructor by using him as their muse.
“Kevin The Pipe Welder” was voted first by the judges and was people’s choice at Friday’s Welding Rodeo 2010 at Bellingham Technical College.
Not bad, considering the performance of OC’s previous teams at the annual competition. Teams have eight hours to craft sculptures that fit within a theme, and no other OC team has finished its creation in time.
The four-person team of Uschi Hladik, Ean Phillips, David Sutton and Rick Lewis was able to select five pieces of scrap metal two weeks before the competition and start planning the sculpture with the theme: the human form. On Friday, 10 amateur teams from colleges around the state got eight hours to select more pieces from a pile of scrap and measure, cut, grind and weld the hunks of steel into something looking human.
Before the competition Snell modeled a pose of a kneeling pipe welder, allowing the team to make photos and take dimensions. They would use those to re-create the form at the competition.
“I’m honored that they did,” Snell said.
Hladik said they wanted to honor their instructor for all of the time, respect and patience he’s shown them in their studies.
Seeing the students win was emotional for Snell.
“It struck a chord with me,” he said. “I kind of choked up a little bit.”
Over two years, Lewis found a friend and mentor in his instructor, and he said Snell’s reaction made his day. “It made me proud,” he said.
The words art and welder might not find their way into the same sentence often, but the Welding Rodeo is an annual opportunity for amateur and professional welders to show off and be judged on their creative and technical skills.
Snell spent years welding at industrial sites where art wasn’t exactly a priority.
“It really makes them have to think under pressure,” he said of the competition.
After the competition, the sculptures are auctioned off to provide scholarship money. Hladik bought the OC team’s sculpture, and Snell plans to reimburse her for it. Then, he hopes to donate it to the college and display it outside the weld shop as a tribute to the team, and a showcase of the talents OC welding students possess. The details on the donation, and whether the display will be allowed, haven’t been worked out yet, Snell said.
Currently the piece is at BTC on display.
The OC Welding Club paid for the trip with fundraisers and through sales at the bookstore, which allowed the team and eight other students to travel to Bellingham.
If the sculpture goes on display at the college, some of the rougher edges may need some smoothing, the team said.
But for Hladik, the current slightly rough state, makes sense.
“That’s the welder though,” she said. “It’s kind of rough around the edges.”
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