One man's trash is another man's treasure

These amazing sculptures were fabricated by an Aussie artist using scrap automotive parts.

46 year old Queenslander James Corbett searches wrecking yards for any old bits and pieces he can find and by the look of things he manages to find a place for every one of them in his intriguing art works.

His sculptures are made from old spark plugs, gears, clutch plates, springs, roller and plain bearings, trim pieces, gearbox casings, headlights, wheel hubs, badges, fan blades, petrol caps, cam chains, hub caps etc. In James’s artistic mind, anything is possible. 

His works are displayed in galleries in the USA, UK and Australia and some of his sculptures are worth thousands of dollars. A ram with its woolly coat created from hundreds of spark plugs reportedly sold for more than $20,000.

James prefers to work with parts from the 1950s and 1960s and particularly those from French and British cars as they offer the most interesting sizes and shapes to feed his fertile imagination.

“I was working in a scrap warehouse and a man I know that races cars showed me a trophy made from old gearshift levers. I looked at it and thought that I could do a much better job, so I started making my own sculptures,” he explained.

“After a period of time people began to become more familiar with (my work) and now what I’m doing with my life is a dream come true.”

On average each piece takes about two weeks to create from scratch but his larger pieces can take much longer. James said that the welding and sculpturing of parts is generally not what consumes most of his time. Often the longest part of the process is finding old parts suitable for sculpture. 

After spending weeks dedicated to locating suitable pieces, James meticulously cleans every part and then welds them together to make these remarkable sculptures.

For more information on the work of James Corbett, the car part sculptor, check out his website at: jamescorbettart.com