No Prizes.

There would be few in the broad equestrian community not familiar with the much sought after Mary Pinsent Bronze trophies, for years handed out to the lucky few. In fact over the last 30 odd years there have been quite a few of the beautiful cold cast bronze statues presented, but rather than diminish, the appeal has increased as, although not originals the beautiful reproductions of all things equestrian are indeed works of art.

Mary Pinsent and her husband, Dick started the company, Realities Cold Cast Bronze about thirty years ago. The company was clearly based on Mary’s talent as a sculptor and the continuation of the company is still based on Mary’s formidable body of work. Horse Deals wondered how the business was being affected by the outbreak of EI and picked up the telephone. Greg Osland answered and related a rather interesting story.

“About 12 years ago, my son Danny began working for Mary and Dick in the business and through Danny I started working for them as well. We always got along with them very well and about eight years ago, Mary and Dick (originally from England) decided they wanted to travel. They said to us one day, we’re going overseas for two years, the business is yours, do what you want; if you get sick of it, just lock the doors and walk away. So they went overseas for two years and when they came back, I had all the books ready for them. They had a brief look and told us they were going to buy a property in Queensland and retire. What about the business, I asked? Just keep doing what you are doing, was the reply; it was all done with a handshake. Mary has been retired now for seven or eight years now, but as you can see on the website she has and incredible body of work and a great range, covering most breeds and disciplines. So with my sons Danny and Scott and my wife, we continue to make cold cast bronze reproductions of Mary’s sculptures.

“The process is labour intensive and involves a rubber mould being made of the original. This is done by applying many cigarette paper thin layers of rubber combined with a fixer over a period of a week. Danny does all the rubber work and Scott does the casting. It is difficult to explain over the telephone, but it is quite a complicated and delicate exercise, especially getting the cast out of the rubber mould using a very sharp scalpel. We make a bronze solution, and apply it to the rubber mould and then fill it with sand and resin, which gives it its weight, and that process is called cold cast bronze.

“It is a family run business and it has been good to us. We don’t advertise, we rely on word of mouth and wait for the telephone calls, faxes and now emails to come in. When EI first started I thought, ‘oh crikey’, we might be in trouble here. Just about all our business is directly related to trophies for horse shows and just about all the shows are cancelled. We had already produced the trophies for Adelaide Royal before it was cancelled. They took them as they can use them for next year, but that will of course affect us next year. Melbourne Show has cancelled and we received an email from the Australian Arabian Society letting us know they may cancel or postpone their National Show. That is such a big show for us. Thanks to racing trophies produced for Victoria, the last couple of months have not been too bad, but they are usually excellent months. We sell trophies to New Zealand and the UK, but most of our work is for Australia.

“The boys are getting work away from the business, with Danny working as a builders labourer for a mate for the last two weeks. That helps tremendously and at the moment we are just playing for time. We are hitting our retailers pretty hard to get them to push horses as Christmas gifts, but until they start having shows again, we are in big trouble and I don’t know what’s going to happen”.

Footnote.
During our conversation with Greg, he explained how easily it was to fix broken statues. “Cats and grand kids are the biggest worry. I would hate to think how many statues had been discarded because a leg had been broken off etc. We can repair them quite cheaply, of course the cost of postage (Realities is in Bellingen NSW) is quite high as they are heavy”.

Mary Pinsent trophies are very hard to come by and not something to be relegated to the cupboard because they are damaged. Now would be a good time to have your trophy repaired and back on the mantelpiece where it belongs.

http://www.realities.com.au/