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Neptune
Paul DiPasquale was chosen unanimously in the national competition sponsored by The Neptune Festival (VBEU Inc.) in 2004.
Paid for by private donations, the one of a kind, copyrighted art work was given to the City of Virginia Beach in 2005.
The original competition model; the specs required a 15 ft tall "realistic" figure of Neptune on a 12 ft base. The length of the final Neptune added 5 ft to the trident = 32 ft height.
One of many early study drawings for the Neptune sculpture anatomy.
Day One of DiPasquale's 3 month stay in China; major corrections had to be made to the 20 ft tall, full scale, 80 ton clay model.
DiPasquale, assisted by Mr. Zhang Cong, the Ningbo foundry owner, quickly finished a 7 ft Neptune maquette to use for proper modeling of the full scale clay Neptune.
Meanwhile, cutting the steel armature and correcting the clay missteps took 8 days: the head was moved back 4 ft. and the arm and turtle were moved up and back 2 ft.
...Moving the arm and turtle.
A resin casting of the 7 ft. maquette was moved in front of the full scale clay Neptune model for specific visual reference.
Some of the Neptune crew in China; 3 of the 4 Chinese sculptors stand out front.
The artist sculpting the loggerhead detail.
DiPasquale finishes details on Neptune's eyes.
DiPasquale with his assistant, Robert Bricker, in front of the finished clay model, ready for the plaster mold.
The full scale clay Neptune figure was cast in over 55 plaster waste mold pieces.
Three teams of 4 men each poured the bronze in 150 lb. crucibles with two men on each pouring arm. No face shields and with no reflective protection from the 2,000+ degree molten bronze...
Chinese workers chisel out the core mold of the raw bronze chest casting; it rests on the dirt floor of the converted steel mill.
The chest section was one of 17 bronze parts shipped via container to WaterFront Marine construction yard in Virginia Beach.
Three containers carried the 17 bronze sections by way of the Panama Canal.
Randy Sutton's team at WaterFront Marine installed the concrete core. The foundation and plinth went 20 ft down and 12 ft up. It centered on a 50 ft long 'H' beam which carried the internal stainless steel support structure.
The bronze animals and the 'live rocks' were craned, drilled, and welded into a kind of '3-D puzzle' figured out on site.
The stainless steel internal structure had to be built and welded sequentially.
DiPasquale and his Lead Welder, Jill Holland, align the head for the internal structure steel welding and external bronze welding
Neptune's turtle floats 12 ft. above the water creatures and the ground level of the boardwalk.
Virginia Tourism Corp. estimates that over 8 million photographs are taken of Neptune yearly.
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