CityView Magazine

There's no 'cooler' art form than ice sculpting A 28 | July/August • 2012 BY MICHAEL JAENICKE atmosphere. The Executive Chef at Highland Country Club also knows ppearance and presentation mean everything to Russell Nuff, from how entrees are plated and ar- tistic accents to taking the time to consider every detail and nuance of a table and the surrounding that some events require an eye-catching centerpiece, a work more show-stopping than a three-tier cake, pastry banquet or special lighting. Enter ice-sculpting creations, which bring oohs and ahhs from everyone in attendance. This art form comes from only water and the work of the artist's two oſten-frozen hands. "It brings added mood and feeling," Nuff said. "It's some- Year's confetti, adding a euphoric and joyous feeling to guests. Nuff, the Club's chef for the past four years, dabbles in ice said Nuff, a certified chef in American Culinary Foods. When Nuff needs advanced designs he frequently turns thing people enjoy and remember." Indeed, ice sculptures can be a culinary equivalent to New sculpting himself, but is oſten too busy directing his 20-mem- ber staff at a club with 800 members. "I do mainly basic sculpting, nothing really elaborate," to Mike Kowalski, whose work in the Fayetteville area — Holiday Inn Bordeaux, Highland Country Club, Raeford and Hope Mills — is widely known and highly regarded. Kowalski has created everything from 20-foot ice bridges to Asian-inspired dragons, majestic angels to oversized golf balls. He said he gets a rush of adrenaline each day when he rises to work 12 to 14 hour days in a freezer workshop where the temperature is about 25 degrees. He has created works for Screen Gems movie studio, one So N'Ice arts work that included a 100-foot long, 10-foot high slide, a 6-foot tall horse standing on its back legs and more traditional 3-D carving such as angelfish, swans and logos. "You name it and I've carved it," said Kowalski, a Wilm- ington resident. "And anything I haven't done is a challenge that takes up all my attention and focus of the moment." "Ski," as he's known in the business world, has been sculpt-

• Cover