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Oct 26, 2024

Macombopoly sculptor: ‘Stainless steel is so fun to work with’

Three stainless steel sculptures adorn Macomb’s courthouse square, including a pair of spinning dice. They are part of the Macombopoly game that can be played through an app. Local artist Gabe Stevens

Three stainless steel sculptures adorn Macomb’s courthouse square, including a pair of spinning dice.

They are part of the Macombopoly game that can be played through an app.

Local artist Gabe Stevens created the sculptures. It was a big undertaking, and the top hat sculpture proved especially vexing.

“It was the heaviest and the biggest, and we had to flip it with an engine hoist and a bunch of friends. So that was difficult,” he said.

“We pushed our limit on that, on us not having the ability to make it. But it still made it out the door.”

The sculptures are the biggest project yet for the artist’s fledgling company, MasterPiece Customs. It’s a journey that began with a high school welding class.

A knack for welding

Stevens said he’s always been mechanically inclined, and always had a knack for fixing things while growing up in southeast Iowa.

Then he took a welding class taught by Jim King during his junior year at Burlington High School.

“As soon as I started that class, I figured out that I had a little bit of a knack for it. So I decided not to be a mechanic and went to welding,” he said.

His first job was at Modern Welding in Burlington, where Stevens discovered quickly that he had a lot to learn.

“I tried to my entire career find someone that did something better than me and I learned how they did it. Some guys may be only good at grinding. Some only good at welding. But I gave them a lot of respect and I learned how they did things better than I did,” he said.

Stevens moved on to another job in 1998, working at Fusion Tech near Roseville in western Illinois. Fusion Tech describes itself as a business that provides custom equipment for the biggest names in food processing, food service, agriculture, transportation, and renewable fuels.

Stevens said that’s where he learned much of what he knows about working with stainless steel.

MasterPiece Customs

About 15 years ago, Stevens started doing projects on the side in addition to his 40-hour work week at Fusion Tech.

“Stainless steel is so fun to work with, I want to do more than just square items and tables and conveyors. So I thought there would be a use for art work,” he said.

But the first thing he built on his own was a set of running boards for a construction worker’s truck.

“He just went through them over and over, and he wanted a pair that wouldn’t rust through. It’s been almost 15 years and he’s put it on about seven different trucks. But that pair of running boards still are just fine (made) out of stainless steel,” Stevens said.

His side jobs became his business, MasterPiece Customs, and about a year ago he left Fusion Tech to devote his time to the business, which creates high-end stainless steel sculptures.

He is still on good terms with Fusion Tech, buys material through the company, and he gets some scrap material from them too.

He said it was painful to leave – it was a very good job and they paid very well -- but now he can work from home and spend more time with his family. MasterPiece Customs is based at his home on four acres outside Biggsville.

“We’re off the beaten path, but at least our road’s paved,” he said.

His shop is an unfinished three car garage. His family spent several years insulating it and upgrading the electrical service.

“We’re small but efficient,” he said.

Stevens wishes he had a higher ceiling, but otherwise the studio provides plenty of space for larger projects. He also has room to work on several projects at a time.

Sometimes one of his sons will come into the shop and play video games while Stevens is working. He likes that.

Working through grief

Stevens was still working at Fusion Tech when Jock Hedblade, Executive Director of Visit Unforgettable Forgottonia, contacted him about taking on the Macombopoly project a few years ago. By the time the job started, Stevens had struck out on his own.

Stevens began working on the sculptures last fall. Then, just a couple weeks into the project, his 20-year old daughter Emma died in a car crash near their home.

“That whole job was built under a lot of emotional times, and it kind of pushed me through some of the grieving process, which I can’t say was healthy or not,” he said.

“But I had a deadline, and I didn’t want to miss it. This was the most important job we’ve had.”

He spent a lot of late nights and long weekends working on the project.

In addition to the aforementioned challenges with the top hat, he also faced challenges with the dice sculpture.

He originally planned to make it rigid. But eventually the Macombopoly committee agreed to have the dice spin. Stevens said it was a major undertaking to mount the framework inside the piece to hold the bearings.

Stevens feels he still has a lot to learn. He said looking at art online can be a good, humbling experience.

“You see someone in Russia or somewhere where they’re building their art projects in the corner of a building that looks like it was exploded, they have minimal tools, it’s not kept up very well, but they’re producing beautiful pieces of work,” Stevens said.

He said if artists get too confident, they will miss out on easy lessons that could save money or produce better results.

Praise for the Macombopoly sculptures

Duke Oursler, a sculpture professor at Western Illinois University, said that as an artist, he always wants to dissect a piece and figure out how it was done.

He said Stevens did a fantastic job on the Macombopoly sculptures, and beyond that, they’re just fun pieces.

“Art doesn’t have to be this profound thing that shakes your soul. It often needs to be something that just enlightens your experience and creates an experience that’s new and different and interesting,” Oursler said.

The dice sculpture is a good example. He said even a child could reach up and push the lower one to make it spin.

“That is a really interesting interactive experience that you just don’t get every day. That’s what art should do,” he said. “It should change your experience. It should give you a new experience. It doesn’t need to change your mind about anything. It just needs to broaden your experience.”

Oursler said the sculpture of the top hat is also really well done, right down to the pattern of the sanding on the surface.

He said the pieces are beautiful and help make Macomb’s courthouse square a joyful place.

Hedblade also thinks the pieces are fantastic.

“Gabe exceeded our expectations,” he said, adding he loves all of the pieces and finds the dice especially interesting because they are interactive.

Hedblade said that as of mid-August, 2,000 people had downloaded the eATLAS app needed to play the Macombopoly game. He believes that number has grown since WIU students have returned to town.

“eATLAS has never in their history had an app or adventure which has been as popular or grown as fast or consistently,” Hedblade said.

He said the sculptures cost approximately $85,000.

Working with stainless steel

Stevens said some people consider stainless steel difficult to work with. But once he learned what to do and what not to do, he found it predictable and easy to work with.

He especially likes the luster of stainless steel after a piece is finished.

“You don’t have to paint it. It doesn’t discolor. It doesn’t oxidize or rust or anything. It’s just kind of an everlasting material,” he said.

The word is getting out about the quality of the work produced by MasterPiece Customs. Stevens said he has other jobs lined up around the U.S. that will be keeping him busy. He’s booked about a year out, largely through word of mouth.

He is also working on a monument to his daughter Emma, who is buried in Aspen Grove Cemetery in Burlington.

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