Agelio Batle: graphite sculptures

Sculptor Agelio Batle makes these unusual implements that are equally an object of art and a functional drawing/writing tool. Each one was meticulously hand crafted in his San Francisco studio. First, he carves an original design in clay. With intense pressure, carbonaceous graphite (same material in pencils) and smudge-resistant compounds are fused into a reproducible form using a proprietary technique that Batle invented. Finally using delicate carving and traditional finishing techniques, the piece is completed. All their surfaces can draw and the graphite will resist smudging onto your hand. With daily use they should last 7 to 9 years.

Batle Graphite Dragonfly
$57.00

Among the earth's oldest creatures, the dragonfly has captivated imaginations across cultures since antiquity. Dragonflies were the winged shamans of Zuni myth and legend, carrying supernatural powers and the possibility of spiritual transformation in their whirlwind of flight. Revered for centuries in Japan, the dragonfly was thought to swiftly carry the spirits of ancestors to their beloveds. These shimmering, iridescent bodies also drift into Western folkloric traditions in which dragonflies were known as the needle-shaped gatekeepers of truth, sewing with threads the voice of the deceitful. .

Batle Graphite Hand
$68.00
166616
It's not the pencil that draws, it is your hand. Whether drawing lines or inscribing words, the act of making marks lures ideas into the physical world. Hands perceive and reveal things that our eyes and conscious minds may never know. We discover things about ourselves and our thoughts by engaging the hand in a mark-making process. San Francisco artist Agelio Batle's Drawing Hand is both a poetic metaphor and a functioning drawing tool; all of its surfaces can write. Committed to making art from materials that are part of daily experience, the artist originated this work by casting his own hand (Drawing Hand No.1) in pencil lead, graphite, each day for the calendar year 1999. Wishing to share the insights gleaned from that sculptural process with a wider public, he similarly cast a child's hand (Drawing Hand No.2) to create the object before you.