Construction Junction - Building Material Reuse

Live art & music

Great art is a big theme of the Steel City Big Pour - satisfying your appetite for fine foods, beers, sodas, and for your creative soul. The Steel City Big Pour has it all!

Live Art

watch

Ice Carving with Rich Bubin, owner of Ice Creations and Master Ice Carver

Rich Bubin's credentials include:

>Team Captain Winter Olympics 2002

• >Guiness World Record Holder, Fastest Ice Carver, 61 block sculptures in 4 hours 20 minutes and 50 seconds.

• >Over 35,000 hand carved sculptures completed 

• >Over 6 million pounds of ice sculpted to date

With that in mind, watch as the world's fastest live ice carver creates a dazzling fire and ice show.

Sandy Kessler Kaminski

Artist's Statement: Having grown up in rural Ohio, I incorporate my childhood connection to the land into art.  Investigating themes of environmental sustainability, human stewardship and the influence of technology on both are the subjects of my work.

Behavioral Scientists have noted that the surrounding environment shapes mental and physical attitudes of its inhabitants. My recent circuit-scapes are dynamic, having the potential to capture the imagination of the viewer.  The circuits represent humanity and function on several different layers with interdependence as a major theme.

In creating a piece for Construction Junction I focused in on the impact one group/entity can have in an entire region.  The influence of Construction Junction’s mission has assisted other economically and environmentally responsible individuals can be clearly seen.  The fact that Construction Junction is so successful in Pittsburgh is both intriguing and a source of regional pride.

Ms Kessler Kaminski’s art is in public, private and corporate collections.  Sandy created solar powered trophies for the 2011 Pittsburgh Technology Council DATA Awards. Her public art piece The Lantern won the Art and Design Grant by the Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh, funded by the National Endowment for the Arts.
 

TRASH Three Rivers Alliance of Serious Homebrewers (TRASH) Home Brewing Demonstration

(yes, brewing beer is, in our opinion, an art)

Pittsburgh Area Artist Blacksmiths Association

We're excited to announce that blacksmith Robert Burns will be here making.... bottle openers! 

David Calfo

Scrap Metal or Work of Art - find the answer here.

David J. Calfo is a native Pittsburgh salvage artist. Born and raised between the glow of the  Hazelwood and Homestead steelworks, David is the Fourth generation of a steel family. David credits the city itself for his education, inspiration and philosophy on life. They say it takes a village to raise a child, but in this case, it was a city like Pittsburgh. David remembers his neighborhood as an oasis of talent, filled with still mill workers, welders, carpenters, professors from nearby universities, and other assorted hard-working "burghers". The close-knit neighborhood was such that he could wander around, check out his neighbor's projects, and often get a first hand lesson on how to build a deck, pull a transmission, cut down a tree, or whatever else needed to be done. David spent the next 25 years as a carpenter, restoring the neighborhoods where he lived, learned and loved. Utilizing the skills he gleaned from his childhood they crumbled away. Realizing the inevitability of Pittsburgh's transition and change, David started collecting local artifacts from the steel mill before they were lost forever.

David opened Blue Collar Gallery in Lawrenceville in 2004. Looking back, David says that he never noticed how much old school values and practices influenced his life he started his art; " I spent my life working with my hands and mind in the city that's my home-not unlike the older neighbors I grew up under." While he works to preserve Pittsburgh's past with new creations, David notes that Pittsburgh has always been a melting pot. Today we're moving fast with a lot of new people, and through our labor, all of the United States.

As a salvage artist, I take the discarded remains of the past and transform them into art that tells a story of the past, present and future. The purpose of my work is to show that objects considered garbage by most can be turned into objects of interest, desire and beauty. The knowledge that the items used in my art, if they weren’t “saved” by me, would be sitting in a landfill is what drives me to create unique pieces. You can be cookie cutter, or build something out of cookie cutters -- I prefer the latter.
 

 

David Edwards Art Energy Design

Solar flower power!

Timbeleza and Studio Capezzuti Puppets for Pittsburgh

Don't be
shy - get
the party
going and 
move to
the
rhythm
with
our
puppets!

TAKE PART

Mosaic - Make and Take

With Daviea Davis

Design and make your own coaster to take home! Daviea Davis is a self-taught glass mosaic artist, living in Pittsburgh’s Edgewood community.  She works primarily in salvaged stained glass and regularly creates community mosaics at Pittsburgh Glass Center and various Pittsburgh schools. Daviea says "Everyone always asks me... "Are you still doing mosaics?"  This is going on 10 years of doing them.  Every time I finish a project, I stare at it and learn from it.  I'm shocked at what it turns out like.  The scraps of glass are the parts that stained glass artists aren't using -- little beautiful subtractions from their pieces reassembled in a totally different way." 

Two amazing mosaics by Daviea now grace the Pittsburgh airport terminal train entrance. They wonderfully capture the spirit of the city and are not be missed.

Screen Printing

Bruce Brinker and friends will help you screen patches and reused t-shirts to take home

Pour Art

With Tim Oliveira and David Hahn.  Be one of the lucky few to add a color to our all-new pour it on artwork (requires a steady hand and a clear eye!).

Decoration Station with Creative Reuse Pittsburgh

Create it!

Live Music

Hoodoo Drugstore

With Robert Peckman, Sam Klingensmith and Mike Sweeney

Hoodoo Drugstore plays Roots-Rock, Soul and Funky Blues.  Throw in some Zydeco and Texas Swing and you have a recipe for a musical good time. 

Core members, Robert Peckman (drums and vocals), Sam Klingensmith (accordian, mandolin, guitar and vocals) and Mike Sweeney (bass and vocals), will be joined by Jim Adler (guitar and vocals) and Eric Spalding (sax).

For this year's Big Pour event, a special guest, John Gresh on piano and vocals will be added.  It's as though we have our very own custom Big Pour band.

CDs for Hoodoo Drugstore, Jimmy Adler Band and Robert Peckman will be available at the event.

For more information see Bone Dog Records.