I’ve been carrying on with my sculpture course. We’ve been doing a full body sculpture with a live model over the last two weeks. Bearing in mind that each session is about 3 hours long, that means we’ve only had about 6 hours (probably less when you count in time spent clearing up) to actually do the sculpture. This is phenomenally quick, at least judged against my usual rate of working – I usually spend ages working on sculptures.
I’m not too happy with what I’ve come up with really, not least because it’s so rushed. Also, the pieces we’ve created are going to be fired which means you need to prepare it for firing. This involves scooping out the larger sections of the sculpture form underneath to make sure none of the surfaces are too thick. You also need to prick the underside with a nail in order to release any trapped air, lest the sculpture explode in the kiln from the air expanding when heated (this I would’ve liked to see!).
Doing this basically involved turning the sculpture over in your hand and scooping out the clay on the underside. Not only did this deform the sculpture – it’s made of wet clay with no internal armature to hold it in place – it also weakened it so when I put it back down, part of the underside collapsed inwards slightly. It all made me think that firing sculptures was a slightly outmoded way of preserving the piece. Maybe it works better for larger sculptures, but if I really wanted to keep my sculpture (which I didn’t really) I would’ve much preferred to make a mold which would’ve given a much better representation of the piece without the need to damage it.
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