As President of the International Institute of Welding (IIW), it is my privilege to welcome you to view our sixth IIW Digital Collection of Welded Art, and for you to enjoy the 2025 submissions related to both improving welding skills and progressing the need to raise awareness of the necessity to protect biodiversity.
IIW has always sought to involve more young people through its activities such as its Young Professionals Programmes. This IIW initiative on welded art which started in 2019, also has a similar positive effect with more and more schools, colleges and universities becoming involved in both their national welded art exhibitions and competitions as well as the IIW ones.
These unique cooperative and collaborative efforts between so many countries truly assist in progressing biodiversity.
We are proud that this IIW 2025 Digital Collection also shows the excellent IIW ethos of cooperation and collaboration with over 40 artists from 11 countries contributing to creating greater awareness of the importance of the relationship of the global welding industry to biodiversity. Please enjoy and pass the Collection onto your friends and colleagues.
Thomas Böllinghaus, IIW President 2023-26
1st June 2025
- Alexander Georgiev Kostov and Dimitar Todorov Ivanov (Bulgaria)
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Alexander and Dimitar were representatives of PTG N. Vaptzarov, Vratsa, in the Bulgarian Welding Society (BWS) 2025 welded art competition. Their exhibit is a mechatronic system depicting the cycle of nature and biodiversity on Earth. Various representations of flora and fauna are located on rotating gears. The idea of the participants is to convey a message: if one of the species disappears, the others also stop their existence (development). This is also emphasised by the symbols welded on the base plate for the species - fish, owl and apple – which represent the vulnerability of the ecosystem and the risk of breaking the entire cycle if even one of its elements disappears. The circle is made thanks to the “Sun”, mounted on an arch, symbolising the sky. In the base plate of the installation are embedded green LEDs, symbolising fields and grasses – a source of life for many other species. At the other end of the “sky” is mounted a “satellite”, embodying humanity’s eternal quest to discover new worlds. They have depicted half of the globe using curved strips and on it, with thin sheet of stainless steel, are situated examples of the flora and fauna. The sun with its life bringing light is mounted on one of the strips. It symbolises the fire that is the essence of life beginning. The symbol of the gymnasium is on the inside of a rectangular plate made from scrap metal with the letters and digits cut in a suitable form. The logo of the school is laser engraved.
Fire Came in the Beginning: the whole system is driven by an electric motor from an old car’s windshield wiper, with a circuit board to adjust the revolutions. The power supply is provided by a 12 V battery. Materials used include carbon sheet metal, square profiles, copper wire and copper cable shoes, scrapped gears, metal studs, nuts, washers and screws.
Welding methods used were Gas Metal Arc Welding (process 135) and Gas Tungsten Arc Welding (process 141) with appropriate filler materials and shielding gases. - Andrey Makhorin (Kazakhstan)
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Andrey is from Atyrau, western part of Kazakhstan. He was born on February 19, 1981. He is a professional welder and is very proud of it and has been working in the big company KazTransOil for more than 20 years.
Grass snake: As he learns more about nature and the environment and the need to protect and improve them, he uses his welded art to highlight challenges we increasingly face. In 2023, he showcased his exhibit “Starry Sturgeon”, a critically endangered fish and in 2024, ”Poison Dart Frog” highlighting the challenges these frogs face with species being classified as endangered to critically endangered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN). The Grass Snake occupies a vast area from eastern Anatolia and eastern Poland and Finland through the Caucasus and the East European Plain, Southern Siberia and Kazakhstan to Lake Baikal and adjacent areas of Mongolia. As a rule, it is darker than snakes of other subspecies and has a uniform body colour. It is not venomous and rarely bites when captured or threatened. This exhibit was made in Andrey’s garage using manual metal arc welding. He made the snake especially in honour of the year of the snake. It is made of 16mm diameter metal rolled reinforcement. The eyes of the snake are 5 mm diameter metal bearings. The branch of the tree was made from 25mm and 15mm diameter pipe. Welding was with manual metal arc welding 111. Patterns and details were put on using files.
- Andrey Nikolaev Aksenov and Vicky Petrova Strashimirova (Bulgaria)
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Andrey Nikolaev Aksenov and Vicky Petrova Strashimirova were representatives of PZHPT Marie Curie, Pernik, in the Bulgarian Welding Society (BWS) 2025 welded art competition. They produced a wonderful Exhibit, “Noah’s Ark”, targeted at showing the salvation of
the living species on Earth.Noah’s Ark: Andrey and Vicky created from metal, a ship and animals – bee, giraffe, goat, rhinoceros, spider, horse, mouse, rabbit, elephant, fly and flower. For the production of the exhibit they used steel bar, profile, nuts, washers and bolts. They applied two types of welding, Shielded Metal Arc Welding (SMAW) - process 111, and Gas Metal
Arc Welding (GMAW) - process 135, and different methods of metal
processing – cutting, bending and grinding. They received guidance and support from teacher Eng. Zornitsa Mavrova. - Anil Kumar Bagarti (India)
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Anil Kumar Bagarti works as a mechanical engineer in fabrication and maintenance at Shyam Metalics & Energy Limited, Sambalpur, Odisha. He has a Bachelor of Technology, majoring in Production Engineering,
obtained at the Veer Surendra Sai University of Technology (VSSUT)
formerly UCE, Burla.Black Cobra: is a sculptural representation of the Indian cobra, crafted entirely from industrial scrap and discarded metal components. The piece aims to reflect the intricate beauty and silent power of this often-misunderstood reptile, which plays a crucial role in maintaining ecological balance by controlling rodent populations. The construction involved arc welding techniques using mild steel rods, chains, and salvaged automotive parts, carefully shaped to capture the sinuous form and alert posture of a cobra. The unique challenge was to convey fluidity and movement through inherently rigid materials. By transforming waste into art, Black Cobra underscores the potential of upcycling as a method of artistic expression and environmental advocacy. The sculpture serves not only as a tribute to biodiversity but also as a reminder of the impact of industrialisation and waste on wildlife habitats. It highlights the importance of coexistence and conservation through creative reuse, aligning with the values of sustainable development.
- Ann Gildner (USA)
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Although an artist for over 40 years, Ann Gildner only began welding
twelve years ago and particularly likes to create large public and private
art. Her Gildner Gallery Studio allows her to create large scale metal
sculptures from 2 to 40 plus feet high in the welding school her studio
is in at Industrial Arts Institute, Onaway, Michigan.Fish: When Ann was asked to make a relief sculpture to represent the fishing industry of Northern Michigan, she began by taking a hike to the
Ocqueoc Falls, the largest waterfall in Michigan’s Lower Peninsula and
the nation’s first universally accessible waterfall.
On a hike along the Ocqueoc River, as you walk along the cool, quiet path, you pause to watch a blue-spotted salamander slink along the forest floor. Further down the trail you hear the call of a black-throated
green warbler as they dart through the thick trees. Nearing the waterfall, you see on the water’s edge a White-Tailed deer ambling along. You stop to investigate the river that is so crystal clear and see some rainbow trout swimming by. On your sleeve a dragonfly takes a rest. This walk gave Ann the vision to create her fisheries sculpture that is exhibited on a local 6-foot-tall limestone rock.
This is biodiversity. All around you, from the lichen covering a nearby rock to the insect buzzing past your ear, organisms are interacting.
Including you! This variety of life, the communities they form, and
habitats in which they live make up life as we know it. So Ann made a scene of Rainbow Trout jumping while catching a dragonfly on a cattail leaf coming out of the water. In the water you see a school of Yellow Perch, with Bluegills and Sunfish swimming by a fallen tree stump. On the riverbed you will see different rocks and plants.Red Cardinals in a Dogwood: In this Commission, Cardinals were once prized as pets due to their bright colour and distinctive song but now in the United States, this species is protected under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act of 1918, which also banned their sale as cage birds. It is illegal to take, kill, or possess northern cardinals, and violation of the law is punishable by a fine of up to US$15,000 and imprisonment of up to six months.It is also protected by the Convention for the Protection of Migratory Birds in Canada.
Red Cardinals are common to see in Northern Michigan and are enjoyed because of their colour. This commissioned sculpture of a male and female Red Cardinal was to their exact size to be mounted in a local art park for people to see up close. It is a reproduction of a local bird in the area.
The steel bodies are welded with a MIG welder which Ann uses as a sculpting tool. The feathers were cut out on a CNC plasma machine for
the exact size of the different feather shapes and sizes. The tree and limbs are made with steel that has be MIG welded, and hand gouged with Carbon Arc Gouging to make texture in the metal.
The red cardinals are perched in a dogwood tree which is one of the first trees that blossom in the spring. The dogwood blossoms are made in stainless steel. - Anna Frlan (Canada)
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Anna was introduced to steel, welding and sculptural artwork in the
Department of Fine Arts at the University of Ottawa in Canada. Upon
graduation, she established a studio practice and has been creating
welded steel sculptures for 25 years. She challenges herself to use
welding in an innovative way, to build up forms and create textures,
fabricating with steel sheets, rods, bars and tubes. She has learned that steel is inherently malleable and may be transformed into an infinite variety of sculptural forms representing the biodiversity of trees, nests and coral reefs.The Navigators (Bees, Birds and Butterflies): Anna researched the biodiversity of bees, birds and butterflies in Ottawa and their inherent navigational abilities to create detailed drawings required for water jet cutting of The Navigators sculptures. 180 bird species nest locally in Ottawa and 80 are at risk. She selected feathers from 9 bird species to create the Bird sculptures. The meteorological symbols found on the sculptures illustrate the intelligence of filoplumes which enable birds to detect weather conditions and determine safe flight conditions.
Of the 94 butterfly species in Ottawa, the Monarch butterfly is one of the species at risk due to habitat loss and nectar sources such as milkweed. In the Butterfly sculpture, the space delineating the form of a butterfly is largely empty, alluding to the threat of extinction.
Wild bee species are also at risk in Ottawa. A recent study at the University of Ottawa revealed that 70% of ground-nesting bees are at
risk because of exposure to pesticides in the soil.Bees memorize the
shapes of bushes, trees and other elements in the landscape to know the way home after a trip for gathering pollen. The Bee flight path sculpture contains information about bus stop names and times for an entire bus route, forever cut into the welded stainless steel sculpture. - Antonio Vladimirov Taushanov and Daniel Stefanov Velkov (Bulgaria)
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Antonio and Daniel represented PG “Acad. S.P.Korolev”, Dupnitsa, at the Bulgarian Welding Society (BWS) 2025 welded art competition.
Together With Nature for a Brighter Future: The materials used for the exhibit were carbon steel and stainless steel. Antonio and Daniel invested in using both precision laser cut figures and waste material, since the recycling of raw materials is also part of the conservation of the natural world. To achieve the effect of the clean waters of the river, they used a specific technique of processing stainless steel – by heating with a gas burner and tapping the metal. They used Shielded Metal Arc Welding (SMAW), Gas Metal Arc Welding (GMAW) and Gas Tungsten Arc Welding (GTAW) processes with appropriate filler materials and shielding gases.
- Ben Masters (USA)
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Ben Masters, from Davis Technical College in Kaysville, Utah, won the
2024 SkillsUSA Welding Sculpture Championships with his sculpture
“The Hunt”.The Hunt: Ben is from Utah, in the United States. He wanted to represent the delicate desert ecosystem of his home state with his piece “The Hunt.”
His goal was to replicate the colour, shape, and texture of the red sandstone rock features that his home is known for. Utah’s mountain lions aren’t as well-known as its red arches, but they are an important predator to the ecosystem.The mountain lion, and the rock feature it stands on, are made of steel. All material for the arch was cut and formed with a plasma cutter. The rock features are completely hollow, so he could hide the welds on the inside. The colour comes from a thin sheet of copper, cut directly over the steel base with a plasma cutter. For the mountain lion, he constructed the torso and appendages separately. He cut the silhouette of each limb from 1/8” steel using a laser cutting table. He welded directly onto the silhouettes to build the 3D shape of each piece before combining them. He mostly used Gas Metal Arc Welding (GMAW), but Gas Tungsten Arc Welding (GTAW) was used for the fine facial features. He added colour to the cat through brass brushing. The juniper tree is made of copper wire and welded to the steel base with silicon bronze.
- Conner Mullen (USA)
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Conner Mullen, a student at Southern Regional Technical College, Tifton, Georgia, started making welded sculptures during his senior year of High School for the SkillsUSA Georgia Welding Sculpture Competition. His sculpture “Terrors Below” was a scene of a giant octopus tearing down the Golden Gate Bridge. This sculpture won the State finals and gained him entry to the National finals for the very first time. Last year, he submitted his sculpture “Afterglow”. The inspiration for this was in memory of his two friends, Austin Douglas and Travis Hughes. This sculpture was a kinetic ocean scene featuring a swimming manta ray and a moving giant clam and placed second in the SkillsUSA National Welding Sculpture Competition.
Afterglow: A definition of Afterglow is “A light or radiance remaining in the sky after the sun has set”. His sculpture, titled “Afterglow”, was created to symbolize the good triumphing over the bad. His sculpture is rich in symbolism. The shipwreck symbolizes loss or troubled times. Even though the ship is small it holds a big role in his sculpture. It is meant to be recognized and remembered for it is hard times that help us grow. As seen in the sculpture, the ship is being engulfed by the beautiful reef, using it to grow. Both he and his friend Austin played soccer together, and Austin’s soccer number was four. In his sculpture, Conner made four different types of animals (manta ray, octopus, clam, and coral) and used four different types of materials, carbon steel, stainless steel, silicon bronze, and copper. As far as the welding techniques to make this sculpture, he used GMAW, SMAW, GTAW, FCAW, and Brazing. His sculpture’s relationship to biodiversity is through all of the different organisms thriving on the coral reef. His sculpture displays a whole ecosystem from the coral using the ship as its base, to the manta ray swimming around looking for food. His sculpture is unique and is aesthetically pleasing because of the beauty of biodiversity.
- Courtney Chard (Canada)
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Courtney is a licensed Steamfitter and Pipe welder by trade. She received extensive formal training via Mohawk College and an apprenticeship at United Association (UA) Local 46 in Toronto. UA Local 46 has one of the most sophisticated training facilities and apprenticeship training programs in Canada. She has worked in the industry since 2002 and excelled in her career in positions including instructor and forewoman.
Exhibits: Courtney likes to give the illusion of movement to her art and achieve this effect by supporting the metal in a way that it looks to be floating (swimming). Firstly, she cuts the metal, often into intricate shapes, using a plasma cutter. To heat or bend thin metal, she grabs her oxygen acetylene torch. To bend thicker round or square stock metal, such as railway spikes, she heats them in her small forge and hammers it out when red-hot. To fuse two pieces of metal together, she reaches for one of three types of specialty welding machines. After she has layered and welded metal pieces to meet her overall vision, she wields an angle grinder to cut, sand down or grind off excess metal, as well as to polish. The koi fish carbon and stainless steel sculpture required a 3D wire frame outline onto which the various metal pieces were placed and held together by the welds. For finishes, Courtney eschews paint in favour of more natural patinas and oils. For the pair of koi fish, motor oil helped achieve a darker colour on the carbon steel of one fish in contrast to the lighter stainless steel of the second; the sculpture represents yin and yang. Vinegar, salt and hydrogen peroxide help rust metal as with the shell of the Turtle exhibit and a blowtorch creates spectacular blue and purple effects on stainless steel. The final step is oil or a clear coat to preserve the finish.
- Emily Stewart (USA)
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Originally from Central New York, Emily moved to South Dakota in 2018 to pursue a career in Diesel Technology where she found her passion for metal and welding.
Forged in Silence: Wings of Change: This piece is dedicated to the lives lost to battles with mental health. The left side represents what others see when someone is struggling with a mental health issue, whole, beautiful, together. While the right side represents the chaotic, shattered, dark insides of someone struggling with this disease. This piece is a reminder that many among us battle their demons in silence, and we never know what someone is going through on the inside. The right side is hand bent ½” rolled steel, heated with acetylene torches and bent to the predesigned shape of the full butterfly wing. The inner part of the wing is made from 5/16” rolled steel, and using the same method as the outer shape of the wing, the inner wing was built. Hand plasma cut 16g sheet metal is welded into some of the full wing. Using heat, these pieces are coloured to give the metal a rainbow look. The left side is made up of hand plasma cut butterflies. Made of 16g steel, three different sizes of butterflies were cut and sporadically placed to make a similar shape as the whole butterfly wing. These butterflies were welded together and attached to round stock to keep the shape and give the wing more structure. The wing was painted teal to represent suicide awareness. Black paint was sprayed on top of the teal and tissue paper was used to give texture and remove some of the black paint giving the butterflies a mixture of teal and black.
- Georgie Seccull (Australia)
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Georgie Seccull is a sculptor and installation artist based in Melbourne, Australia. She creates large-scale stainless steel sculptures of animals and other creatures seemingly locked in motion. Composed of numerous pieces cut from metal sheets, the materials lend themselves to organic forms like feathers, scales, wings, or the armaments of crustaceans.
Gatekeeper: Lyrebirds have always felt incredibly mysterious and majestic to Georgie with their endless repertoire of mimicking sounds. She thinks of them fondly as the gatekeepers of the forests they inhabit. They are the record keepers of all the comings and goings. Unfortunately all too often that includes their mimicking sound of a chainsaw, highlighting the very real threat they are under of deforestation. Georgie uses AISI 304 stainless steel sheets ranging from 0.5mm – 1mm in thickness and AISI 304 stainless rods ranging from 3mm – 10mm in thickness. Firstly, she creates the skeleton of the piece with the rods. She paints the metal sheets with various metallic spray paints creating a hue of subtle colour variations – greys, charcoals, golds. She then cuts the sheets using a plasma cutter. She scatters the individual pieces on the floor and then works them like a jigsaw puzzle to weave them onto the skeleton frame to create the sculpture. Each time she selects a shape of sheet metal from the floor, she smooths the edges with a bench grinder and various air-tool grinders and then shapes it using an English wheel. She uses Gas Metal Arc Welding (GMAW) with stainless steel wire and pure argon gas to weld the sheet metal to the framework. She then finishes the piece with a matt gloss spray finish to hold the colour.
- Grigorii Dochkin (Ukraine)
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Grigorii Dochkin was an instructor at the Training and Qualification Centre of the E.O. Paton Electric Welding Institute in Kyiv, Ukraine.
He also had a tremendous ability for producing welded art particularly in Titanium. Grigorii passed away in 2013 but he left an indelible impression with his welded art including a self-portrait of himself. Although the actual practice of welding Titanium is very similar to welding mild steel, the effects of having oxygen contamination in the welds can have a serious effect on the integrity of the welds. The degree of contamination can be indicated by the actual colour of the weld ranging from a bright silver lustre indicating no contamination through to light or heavy straw colour with slight contamination and dark blue, purple and yellow with heavy contamination. Although this colour process may indicate a decline in the weld quality, for an artist it can give an array of colours to enhance the visual appearance of the exhibit. The following exhibits show the tremendous range of talent and skills embraced by Grigorii using Gas Tungsten Arc Welding (GTAW) to produce them.
- GW Graham Secondary School Team (Canada)
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GW Graham Secondary School in British Columbia staff are passionate about empowering students through hands-on learning in the trades and continuously advocating for youth participation in skilled trades. Project-based learning where students apply advanced welding techniques to create meaningful, often large-scale, art pieces, is used to enhance their skills. Technical training is blended with creative expression, helping students develop both employable skills and a deeper connection to their craft. Several community-focused welding projects have resulted all under the guidance and motivation of the high school welding teacher, Bradley Bootsma.
Grizzly Bear BBQ: The Grizzly Bear BBQ is a life-size welded sculpture that also functions as a fully operational barbecue. It was built entirely from repurposed steel by senior high school welding students as a capstone project. The grizzly bear was chosen not only for its significance as a keystone species within North American ecosystems, but also because it is the school’s mascot—making the project deeply personal and meaningful to the student body and community. The build incorporated MIG welding, plasma cutting, bending, and metal forming techniques, with careful attention to structure, shape, and artistic detail. It took about 5,000 hours to complete. The students first welded together the skeleton of the 4000-pound bear, then covered it with sheet metal. They worked painstakingly to get the shape just right, and covered it with thousands of pieces of rusted metal to simulate the fur. Students used recycled and scrap metal materials to emphasize sustainability and environmental responsibility. The sculpture is designed to spark conversation around biodiversity, especially the importance of protecting large mammals like the grizzly bear that play vital roles in their habitats. In alignment with UN Sustainable Development Goals 14 and 15, the project encourages dialogue around conservation and sustainability, both locally and globally.
- Hilary Clark Cole (Canada)
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Canadian sculptor Hilary Clark Cole was born in Victoria, British Columbia and is a graduate of the Ontario College of Art and Design. She has lived and worked in Muskoka since 1971.
Grizzly Bears, Mother and Cubs: The Grizzly Bears, Mother and Cubs, is a tribute to the place in Canada where Hilary was born, British Columbia. It is a female grizzly, who is sensing danger, and has pushed her cubs to her flank, fiercely protecting them. This sculpture is created of 1/8th inch Corten Steel plate, a steel alloy which rusts to a beautiful grizzly brown, but does not continue to corrode further. In order to give this sculpture a true ‘grizzled’ appearance, Hilary chose to cut the steel plate into individual hairs (a rough calculation suggests that she cut 40,000 pieces), and welded them, one at a time, to the skeletal frame of the bear. In the foreground of other photos on her website of her working on this sculpture, you can see the ‘maquette’, or model. The exhibit is installed at ‘The Colonial, Hwy 12 and Manning Road, Whitby, Ontario’, and is accessible to the public.
Tree Swallow and Young: The focus of the piece is two little open-mouthed babies in the notch of the tree, competing for the dragonfly in their mother’s mouth. Although the Tree Swallow was an extremely difficult challenge in this material, Hilary was determined to recreate the spirit of a delicate aerial acrobat, moving, not still. She knew that the steel, if handled properly, would allow her to interpret this subject. The body of the mother bird is of steel rod, using a ‘drip’ technique to build up a surface, and then grinding down by hand to perfect the form, a lot of trial and error, but the only way to do it, although it took a long time to get it right. She would wistfully leave her at night and come out the next day and know that she was still not ready for her wings. But, finally, the wings! Thin thin shards of steel feathers, cut to shape, welded with a tiny .02 tip, and then hammered, engraved, and torch coloured. The nesting tree is made from sheets of steel sheet and plate. She distressed the steel and rusted it to give it a different texture and colour.
- Ian Lowe (Canada)
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Ian Lowe (Lowe Tide Design) is a Coast Salish metal sculptor based on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada. With over 30 years of experience in welding and fabrication, he transitioned from senior management at one of British Columbia’s largest steel fabrication and welding manufacturers to a full-time artist. His work is inspired by the biodiversity of the West Coast, capturing the delicate balance between wildlife, land, and ocean in stainless steel, often incorporating wood and stone.
Colossal the Giant Squid: Giant Squids are the largest of all the living cephalopods and the largest individual invertebrate in the world. There is still little known of the identity, distributions, biology and behaviour of giant squids. Two thirds of the length of these squids is made up by a pair of long feeding tentacles each bearing an elongate club on the tip. These metre-long tips bear large suckers armed with toothed horny rings.
Seafood Montage: Vancouver Island is renowned for its fishing industry. This montage shows three examples of marine life which make a significant contribution to the success of the industry. The two ocean-inspired sculptures, a dynamic salmon and a striking crab, are handcrafted entirely from stainless steel using a combination of plasma cutting, Gas Tungsten Arc Welding (GTAW) and Shielded Metal Arc Welding (SMAW). Each form was forged by hand, then heat-treated for patina, buffed and polished to enhance their natural brilliance. Rooted in a deep personal connection to the ocean, both pieces reflect a harmonious blend of technical precision and reverence for life.
Eternity: is a sculpture honouring the bald eagle. The biodiversity of the Bald Eagles on Vancouver Island is currently threatened by deforestation, shoreline development and pesticides accumulated through the food chain. Ian’s eagle sculpture Eternity is 100% hand forged and welded stainless steel mounted in a stainless steel tree with 3/8in thick stainless steel round base plate and a concrete slab.
- Jackie Morris (Canada)
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Jackie is a welding technologist with involvement in training in welding skills at Conestoga College of Technology and Advanced Learning in Ontario, promoting careers in welding to a diverse range of people. Between inspiring future tradesmen and running one of the College’s many welding sites, she enjoys creating welded art. Her exhibit focuses on SDG 15 “Life on Land” which has its primary aim to protect, restore, and promote the sustainable use of terrestrial ecosystems.
Roots Required: The exhibit used reclaimed galvanised steel sheet, stainless pipe, an electrode container canister, a barrel and a half, a barrel ring, components from an old school desk, a couple of rings from an old tractor exhaust stack, candle holder and old garden art reinvented. Processing applications used included Plasma Arc Cutting, FCAW, GMAW, angle grinder and hand tools, hammer, anvil and a vice.
- Jason deCaires Taylor (United Kingdom)
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Jason deCaires Taylor is an accomplished sculptor, environmentalist and underwater photographer famous for creating underwater museums and sculpture parks with over 1200 artworks being submerged throughout the world’s oceans and seas. These include locations in Mexico, Grenada, United Kingdom, Bahamas, Maldives, Spain, Indonesia, Norway, France, Cyprus and Australia.
Molly Steer: Molly Steer is a remarkable young activist who took action against plastic straws at the age of nine. Inspired by the documentary A Plastic Ocean, Molly embarked on a mission to eliminate single-use plastic straws by encouraging schools across Australia to join her ‘Straw No More’ movement. Her initiative has garnered support from over 3,000 schools in Australia and has gained traction globally with hundreds of thousands of individuals pledging to stop using plastic straws. Molly’s campaign showcases the power of young voices in effecting real change. In the sculpture created by Jason, Molly stands beside a pillar made of straws representing the detrimental impact of plastic waste. The formation of the straws at the base of the sculpture aims to create an intriguing habitat for marine life, symbolising the need to protect our oceans and the species that inhabit them. Although the sculpture is cast concrete, it has a welded stainless armature. In sculpting, an armature is a foundational internal framework or skeleton that provides support and structure to a sculpture.
Ocean Siren: Jason’s Ocean Siren is a 4m high sculpture serving as a warning system about the warming seas threat to the Great Barrier Reef. It is located off the Strand Promenade on Townsville’s seafront, and was inspired by Takoda Johnson, a young indigenous girl from the Wulgurukaba tribe. Ocean Siren – Underwater Sculpture by Jason deCaires Taylor – Takoda is shown in the sculpture holding a traditional indigenous communication device, a Bayliss shell, while looking to Magnetic Island and the Great Barrier Reef. Based on daily water temperature data from an Australian Institute of Marine Science (AIMS) weather station on Davis Reef, the colour of the sculpture changes at night. This visual representation of current conditions helps raise awareness about the risks of warming seas to coral reefs. The structure of the sculpture is fabricated in two halves. The half facing the ocean from 316 stainless steel welded plate and that facing the shore highly durable translucent acrylic. The structure remains out of the water at all times and features a matrix of 202 multi-coloured LED lights that are illuminated each day at sunset and the figure gradually changes colour from the centre of the figure to its extremities, similar to a heat sensing camera image. The sculpture aims to bring reef science to people globally in a live, visual, and impactful manner, helping to convey a clear message about this complex issue.
- John Freeman (United Kingdom)
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John Freeman is an exceptionally talented metal worker who studied art at university prior to moving over to the engineering/welding discipline and his creative talents shine through with the masterpiece that he has created.
The Welsh Knife Dragon: The Komodo dragon and other land lizard species are important parts of ecosystems and face threats due to climate change, habitat loss, and other factors, impacting biodiversity. Historically and mythically, dragons have been used to symbolise Power and Authority. Its depiction on the current Welsh Flag illustrates this. John Freeman designed and created an exhibit using a youth being shielded by a dragon that has approximately 4000 of the amnesty knives covering the wings of the dragon. The dragon has been built by using carbon steel rods, shaped for the ‘bones’ and skin put on using recycled off-cuts of sheet metal from the fabrication workshop. Carbon steel sheet metal scales were cut out on the CNC plasma cutter. Students in training assisted throughout the build process. One particular trainee, Cairan Johns, made the complete tail section, meticulously cutting, forming, shaping and hammering dents in the sheet metal, to create a mottled, blistered effect tail, which looks amazing.
- K Selvakumar (India)
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The Welding Research Institute (WRI) at Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited (BHEL) in Tiruchirappalli (Trichy), India, will celebrate its 50-year anniversary of its formation in 2025. It was established on Nov 1, 1975 by the Government of India with assistance from UNIDO/UNDP under the aegis of BHEL. It is the premier research institute in welding in India and has been instrumental in promoting welding research in the country. To recognise this achievement, K Selvakumar, a welding technician at WRI, decided to create a welded art exhibit which became the runner-up in the IIW-India National Competition Welded Marvels 2024 “Project Trash to Treasure”.
KALPAWRIKSHA: The tree is made out of different scrap materials and cut bits of electrodes. The base is made of bead-on-plate welding using the Submerged Arc Welding (SAW) process on 16 mm thick alloy steel plate (SA 335 Gr.22). The bottom trunk of the tree is made of a cut piece of 127 mm dia carbon steel pipe welded to the top trunk made of 114 mm dia alloy steel using Flux Cored Arc Welding (FCAW). To obtain the required finish representing the bark of the tree, beads were deposited using Gas Metal Arc Welding (GMAW). Limbs of the tree are cut bits of alloy steel tube (Gr.12) attached to the trunk by fillet welds and rod at the other end made by Shielded Metal Arc Welding (SMAW). Further branches are made of 6.3 mm dia core wires of expired E7018 electrodes and 2.4 mm dia Gas Tungsten Arc Welding (GTAW) filler rods. The shiny bunch of leaves of the tree are made from 0.3 mm thick aluminium sheet. The fully grown five prop/aerial roots in the tree indicate the five decades of service to the Nation, with sprouts for emerging decades. On the whole, the welded art exhibit symbolises the expertise and skill sets of the manpower of Team WRI.
- Luis Huertas Tamayo (Spain)
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Luis Huertas Tamayo lives in Sant Fost de Campsentalles, Spain. He studied agricultural engineering at the Barcelona School of Agricultural Engineering in the class of 1989.
War and Peace: Luis likes to make sculptures using bare welding rods with other materials incorporated with them in the design. This is shown in the War and Peace sculpture where he has incorporated recyclable materials. The green leaves are made from recycled glass beer bottles and the gun from recycled scrap metal. The left-hand side of the sculpture represents “Peace” and the right-hand side “War”. The red line between the part of peace and the part of war, made with red glass, symbolises the blood that is shed in the transition from life to death.
- Lynden Gould and Danek West (Canada)
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Lynden Gould and Danek West are both Grade 12 welding students at Crocus Plains Regional Secondary School in Brandon, Manitoba. Both students have been welding for four years in the high school program, and hope to move on to a career in the welding industry.
The Bear: The sculpture was created using the Gas Metal Arc Welding, Plasma Arc Cutting and Oxy-fuel Torch cutting and heating processes used for shaping material. The project was completed using all recycled materials from both the Welding Technology shop and auto parts from the Automotive Technology shop. Selected materials were cut, formed and welded into place in order to complete the structure. Although this project was created with Gas Metal Arc Welding, both students are also skilled and knowledgeable in Shielded Metal Arc Welding, Plasma Arc Cutting, Gas Tungsten Arc Welding, Oxy-fuel Welding and Cutting and Braze Welding.
- Mike van Dam (Australia)
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Artist and Stainless Steel Welder Mike (Michael) van Dam was born in New Zealand and lives in Queensland, Australia, with his wife and two children and is a world-renowned stainless-steel sculptor.
Dolphin: The exhibit is made from approximately 500 metres of 4mm 316 stainless steel chain. Each link has four welds made by Gas Tungsten Arc Welding (GTAW) and are easy to clean and blend in well with the links.
Seahorse: The exhibit is made from approximately 800 metres of 4mm 316 stainless steel chain. Each link has four welds made by Gas Tungsten Arc Welding (GTAW) and are easy to clean and blend in well with the links.
- Owen Croft (United Kingdom)
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At WEC Group Training Academy, immense pride is taken in nurturing the next generation of metalwork professionals. One approach is to involve apprentices in metal artwork projects. Throughout the projects, apprentices such as Owen Croft hone techniques such as TIG welding, as well as traditional metalworking methods like dishing, raising, and the safe and correct use of hand tools—skills that are fundamental to becoming a highly skilled fabricator and welder.
The Doberman Dog: One of WEC’s standout training projects, The Doberman Dog Sculpture, is a testament to the creativity, technical skill, and dedication of WEC’s apprentices. Crafted entirely from 316 stainless steel washers, the large-scale sculpture was designed and fabricated by one of WEC’s rising star apprentices, Owen Croft. This visually striking artwork features washers of various sizes, with the majority being 35mm outside diameter, showcasing meticulous attention to detail and precision craftsmanship. The stainless-steel Doberman sculpture was purposefully integrated into WEC’s Apprentice Curriculum to help trainees meet and exceed industry standards while learning valuable skills.
- Ricard Mira (Spain)
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Ricard Mira was born in 1952. He learned to weld while working at the Derbi motorcycle company where, later on, he became a fitter for the motorcycles which won the World Championship repeatedly.
Hopeful Lynx: The exhibit is the head of a male Iberian lynx made with welded steel and inox in Ricard’s style, which he calls cold forging. It combines fullness and emptiness, as usual in his human representations. The sculpture is finished with graphite.
- Richard Moffatt (Australia)
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Richard Moffatt has spent his life working with metal. As a qualified artisan welder, he has been employed on many major welding projects during his career, particularly involving high quality pressure pipework on power stations, petrochemical plants and in the mining industry. His sculptural career began 20 years ago, and as an award-winning artist, he now resides and works near Bega on the far south coast of New South Wales, Australia.
The Davar Giving Tree: The Davar Giving Tree represents caring and support at its core. It was gifted by the Davar Family to the Sydney Adventist Hospital (SAN) as a symbol of everlasting generosity and recognition. The Tree has been sculpted from steel and copper, rising from a wide base, as if growing from the floor. As Richard Moffatt said, the Tree is a metaphor for the hospital, made from the same skeletal material as the building. It is an eye-catching hand-forged structure, with roots, a gnarled trunk, and hundreds of hammered light-reflecting leaves. Now installed in a foyer opposite the main reception area at the hospital, the leaves can be engraved with details of future donors.
- Rodrigo Spinelli (Spain)
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Rodrigo Spinelli is an Italo-Brazilian artist specializing in steel sculpture and drawing, with a studio in Tallada d’Empordà, Catalonia. He studied with Pablo Bruera and at institutions such as the Royal Academy of Arts and Florence Academy of Arts. Rodrigo’s welded art merges traditional techniques with contemporary vision, exploring geometry, transformation, and elegance. His work is dedicated to defending nature and diversity, earning international recognition, including the 2022 Reial Cercle Artístic de Barcelona Sculpture Prize for “Gordelícia.” He has pieces in Spain, France, Brazil, the UK, and Italy.
The elegant flight of the heron: The heron’s flight, with its striking elegance, inspired Rodrigo to express, in metal, the duality between the material’s weight and the lightness of flight, strength and the delicacy of the legs, and the unique poetic curve of the neck. For this work, he used 1.5 mm steel sheets, beginning with drawings on cardboard. The sheets are plasma-cut, shaped cold by hand or with simple tools, assembled with MIG-MAG welding, and finished with matte white spray. An innovative feature is the body’s multiple slots, allowing many wing configurations. It is designed to be suspended by almost invisible steel wires, so it captures the heron’s graceful flight.
- Scott Schneider (USA)
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Scott’s welded art background started shortly after starting welding school in the spring of 2022. Prior to welding school, he had some welding experience where he built ornamental fencing and dabbled in a handful of “blacksmithing” projects. Since the first time he struck an arc, he fell in love with welding and the capabilities it gave him to create just about anything that was within his skillset and resources.
September Sunrise: September Sunrise represents wildlife conservation, habitat conservation, and the many beautiful resources of New Mexico. One of Scott’s main goals was to create a metal sculpture that was crafted as realistically as possible. The sculpture is made from various metals such as mild steel, stainless steel, and copper. By using different welding and cutting processes—Gas Metal Arc Welding (GMAW), Gas Tungsten Arc Welding (GTAW), Shielded Metal Arc Welding (SMAW), Plasma Arc Cutting (PAC), Oxy Fuel Cutting (OFC)—and using a hand grinder/Dremel tool, he was able to create all the different parts of the elk and its habitat. All of the parts in the sculpture started as raw pieces of different structural shapes and metals that went through a process of cutting, grinding, and welding to reach their more refined forms that are shown in the sculpture. Welding processes for the different parts were chosen according to material type and their location on the sculpture.
- Sergey Minakov (Ukraine)
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Sergey Minakov is Associate Professor in the Welding Department of the National Technical University of Ukraine, Igor Sikorsky Kyiv Polytechnic Institute. Sergey has creatively combined both his professional activity in welding and his hobby of welded art and photography.
Biodiversity of My Region: The welded sculpture Biodiversity of My Region shows the animal and plant world around the city of Kyiv, Ukraine. The main structural element of the sculpture is a supporting rectangle, which is a screen into the world of nature with unique flora and fauna. In this screen one can observe nature with animals, birds, insects, fish and reptiles. Each living creature is depicted in its corresponding environment: on (and in) the ground, on (and in) the water, in the air, on plants. The construction material used was low carbon steel. The following technologies were used in the production:
• computer processing of photos (adaptation of real photos into graphics);
• cold forging of figures (steel wire with diameters of 3, 4, 5 mm);
• mechanical cutting;
• TIG welding;
• TIG welding-brazing with CuSi3 solder;
• MAG welding.
- SVNIT Team (India)
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As part of the IIW-India National Competition for Welded Marvels (2024) “Project Trash to Treasure”, a team from the Advanced Welding Laboratory, S V National Institute of Technology (SVNIT), Surat, Gujarat, combined to produce the sculpture Lion. Akshay Bhupatbhai Patel, Rasaniya Bhumika Shivkumar and Sai Charan (left to right in team photograph), under the guidance of Dr V. D. Kalyankar, Associate Professor, Department of Mechanical Engineering (DoME), SVNIT, comprised the team.
Lion: The sculpture was fabricated at the Advanced Welding Laboratory, SVNIT Surat, using scrap materials and gas metal arc welding to join the materials. Scrap materials involved mild steel metal rings, strips, hooks, sheet and wire as well as galvanised bolts, washers and nuts. The conversion of this scrap material into the Lion face sculpture serves as encouragement to society for reuse, reduce and recycle for a better future. It exemplifies creativity, sustainability, and skilled craftsmanship. This project demonstrates how discarded materials can be transformed into a striking piece of art through innovative welding techniques, emphasizing the importance of recycling and repurposing waste. It also underscores the significance of welding as a vital industrial skill that contributes to both functional and aesthetic advancements. Displayed at SVNIT Surat, this lion sculpture serves as a motivational piece, urging individuals and industries to rethink waste management and embrace eco-friendly solutions while appreciating the fusion of engineering and art.
- Vinit Barot (India)
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A railway station is often the first impression a visitor forms about a city — it is the face of the place, a reflection of its identity. In that spirit, Vadodara Railway Station has emerged as a true symbol of the city’s rich cultural heritage and artistic vibrancy.
Croc mother and child: This sculpture has been installed near the middle entry gate towards the Enquiry Counter at the Vadodara Railway Station. A special platform has been created for the exhibit so citizens can click “Selfies” with it. One idea of this sculpture is to sensitize people about caring for their living heritage—the crocodiles in the region. The exhibit is of a Sweet Water Crocodile which refers to the Mugger Crocodile (Crocodylus palustris), also known as the Marsh Crocodile. This species is a medium-sized, broad-snouted crocodile found in various freshwater habitats, including rivers, lakes, marshes, and even coastal areas. The male is generally between 3 to 4 metres long and female 2 to 3 metres long. For a sculpture of this size, it is important that an accurate armature is made to assist with both supporting the sculpture as it is being made but also to ensure correct form and shape of the crocodile is achieved.
- Zavaczki Walter-Levente (Romania)
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Zavaczki Walter-Levente is a sculptor based in Székelyudvarhely, Romania. He was born on October 24, 1975, in Felsővisó, Romania. He graduated from the University of Fine Arts in Oradea, majoring in Sculpture (1997–2002). His artistic practice focuses primarily on large-scale public sculptures, working mainly with welded metal. His themes explore the connection between humans and nature, the use of ancient symbols, and the fusion of contemporary and traditional forms.
Steel and Zinc Eagle: The Steel and Zinc Eagle is a monumental sculpture made of welded steel, using recycled and galvanised steel. It was created with technical precision and strong symbolic expression. The sculpture stands in front of a church in the town of Battonya, Hungary, as part of a memorial monument. The eagle is a recurring motif in Walter-Levente’s artistic work, representing strength, vision, and the human–nature relationship. The sculpture refers to the biodiversity of mountainous regions, where birds of prey play a crucial ecological role. By reusing industrial materials, Walter-Levente’s aim is to emphasize sustainability and environmental awareness. The sharp lines and dynamic form of the sculpture capture the spirit of freedom and vitality. He uses various cutting and welding methods depending on which is more efficient for the given task. For straight cuts, he prefers manual guillotine shears; for curved shapes, plasma or electric sheet cutters; and for large sheets he uses an angle grinder. As for welding, he uses MIG/MAG, TIG/WIG, MMA, and occasionally oxy-acetylene, based on the required surface finish or strength. The feathers were cut with a guillotine, tack welded with MAG, and then fully welded. For the legs and head he used MMA welding. Surface treatments, softening or smoothing were often done with an oxy-acetylene torch.