The foundry on the University of Santa Cruz campus has a long tradition of inviting guests to watch their spectacular bronze pour. This year’s pour is especially significant given it is the 50th anniversary of the Foundry, which is Green Lab Certified for its commitment to sustainability. Fall’s bronze pour took place on November 19, with special guest Doyle Foreman.
Professor Emeritus Doyle Foreman, who was the first Black faculty member in the Arts Division and is now in his 90s, created the Foundry in the mid-1970s, and taught all of its early classes. Through the years Foreman taught three sculpture making classes at the Foundry and has been a successful bronze sculptor who often focusing on capturing Black experiences through abstraction. Many of his works are currently on exhibit at the Mary Porter Sesnon Gallery until Dec. 7.
When Foreman considered retirement, he brought on Sean Monaghan (Kresge ‘83), his former student who, in the years since he graduated, started his own foundry to take over. Foreman eased Monaghan into the role over the course of three years, slowly having Monaghan take on one class every year until he taught all three. “He phased me in while he was gracefully retiring,” says Monaghan. That was 20 years ago.
The bronze pour is part of a class students can take. The bronze sculpting class and the consequent public bronze pour used to happen every quarter. Monaghan describes there being a “rhythm” to the event, which was mostly communicated to the Art Department and through word of mouth. The class was slowly reduced to once or twice a year. Then “COVID broke the whole rhythm of everything” according to Monaghan. While this isn’t the first bronze pour since the return from the pandemic, it’s still not happening at the rate it used to. Fortunately, the bronze sculpting class will be happening again in winter quarter, so there is still time for students to take the class, and anyone interested in watching the next bronze pour can be sure to reserve a spot when the date gets closer.
Foreman made a special appearance at this Fall’s bronze pour to help celebrate the 50th anniversary. “It’s always like home,” Foreman says of visiting the UC Santa Cruz campus and the Foundry. “It's what I wanted at the beginning. It worked out fine.”
At the bronze pour audience members eagerly gathered around, with those in the first two rows wearing protective goggles, to watch the pour. There were about a dozen molds made of flame retardant materials that the students had been working on during the quarter. The bronze was heated to roughly 2,075 degrees before they could begin. Molds were arranged with their funnel-like spouts at the top side by side, each surrounded by sand to catch any spilled metal.
Though the students make the molds, they do not work with the bronze itself. Monaghan sometimes allows students to work with aluminum which is a lot lighter, and with a lower melting point and is therefore less dangerous.
A bronze pour is a four-person job for which Monaghan brought on two former students who’d taken the class a decade ago and worked with him at his private foundry, along with another associate. One person indicated which castes still needed to be filled and by how much, one operated the large overhead machine that carried most of the weight of the bronze, and one assisted Monaghan in guiding the bronze and gently tipping it into each mold. “It’s quickly cooling, that’s why we are quickly pouring the metal as fast as we can,” says Monaghan.
After each mold was filled Monaghan and his team waited for the bronze to cool and turn black, a relatively quick process taking under an hour. They took their new sculptures outside, coated them with water and removed the molds to reveal what was inside. Students from the class watched on as their sculptures became a reality.
The UC Santa Cruz Foundry is the last one remaining in the UC system. Thanks to events like the bronze pour, the Foundry has been given very much needed donations over the years. ““The building is old but it's hanging in there,” says Monaghan. “We’ve been able to upgrade some equipment which is great because a lot of it is original.”
More information on the Foundry can be found on its webpage, and students can look at what classes are offered. Donations to the foundry and the Art Department as a whole are also possible through the Art Department’s website. Giving students the best education includes funding one-of-a-kind classes like those at the Foundry.
