The Nine Steps To Create Modern Lilies And Not Die In A Fiery Explosion!

Damaged artwork, an unforgiving environment (it was over 100 degrees and we were nearly out of beer), a sense of humor, and a lot of gunpowder are the keys as Vega embarks on his new quest to create exploded lilies. Here are the nine steps!

1.  I'm always nervous at this point.  A blank board presents a lot of pressure.

2. I can handle this easily enough. Paint some acrylic lilies.  A few coats should do it If I don't paint too quickly.

3.  The concept is simple. We gotta protect the flowers. So I add some stencils with rock to hold them down.  Damn it's windy. Wind sucks.

4.  Now I'll place the fuse.  Then I very slowly add different grades of  gunpowder.  I direct it to small areas.  As you can see, this plan gives us many chances to die in a fiery explosion.

5.  Now presuming I didn't fuck up, I send Harrison in.  It's good to work with smart people. We are going to be lighting the fuse, exploding the gunpowder and burning the artwork with high-speed fuse. We are blowing it up on purpose, this could be the last step. Ever. Here goes...

6.  If we can pull it off, we will not have the lilies "death by fire".  We hope there is not a crater where the artwork once was.

7.  We survived. Now, this thing is a mess of char and debris. Time to use my large brush and my old Hoover. We have to clean as necessary.

8.  So there are no excuses.  We haul it back inside. Here are the charred remains of my art.  It smells.  Now I commence with finishing it by brushing and scraping.  Then we seal it up to prevent smudging.

9. So we had a plan.  It took a lot of energy.  It's finished.  Lilies. Boom!

There you have it.  The nine steps to not die in a fiery explosion and create some cool pop art lilies.  Good work at The Blast Factory. Thank you Harrison!

Stick Vega is the American Gunpowder Artist and author of LESS KILLING. Stick currently lives and creates explosive pop art at The Blast Factory in Madison, Wisconsin. Not limited to one medium, he works in gunpowder drawings and paintings, photography, digital art and writing. Follow Stick on Facebook and/or Twitter.