The Escape
Artist Statement:
Hand-formed metal art, such as mine, is probably more forgotten than unique. What I do, forming metal by hand, hit by hit and weld by weld, has been done for thousands of years. However, machinery and computers have deemed it simply unromantic. I stand firm that beautiful things can still be made with traditional metal styling and adored instead of just being made “useful.” I strive to create things that most people would never imagine being made from or of metal.
About Jefferson Davis
Jefferson “Jeff” Davis was born and raised in Crescent, Iowa, and now resides in Woodbine, Iowa. His sister nick-named him “MacGyver” at a young age because of his ability to mend broken items and create functional items with ordinary objects he found. He never lost his interest to make the old new or to create statements with ordinary objects.
From the time he first landed himself in Sheet Metal Workers Local Union 3, he enjoyed learning the tricks of the trade and attending school for Metal Inert Gas welding, Tungsten Inert Gas welding, wire welding and more, graduating in 1998. Prior to that, a four-year stint in the United States Army as a medic from 1992-1996, prepared him for just about anything that would come his way.
He’s never lost his drive to be an artist, working with a medium he has grown to love: Cold metal. He enjoys a wide array of creating, from developing realistic pieces with all metal patina finishes, such as in his Wildlife Series, to fictional creatures and “art that moves and is functional,” as is with modified bicycles and abstract pieces.
Davis has a firm belief that art tells you what it wants to become, and not the other way around.
His business, Heavy Metal Renaissance, LLC, was launched in 2015, and was able to get off the ground after winning an “Open4Business” contest, hosted by Main Street Iowa. Jefferson enjoys building accurate replicas of “larger than life” realities in cold steel leaving many in awe at their enormity. Davis has been privileged enough to have shipped pieces across the United States, and even a few in Europe.
For more information and for more photos, visit Heavy Metal Renaissance on Facebook at www.facebook.com/theheavymetalrenaissance, email heavymetalrenaissance@yahoo.com or call (712) 592-3913.