Refining the emotion of Loss

 Deadlines, deadlines, deadlines. Haven't been able to post as regularly as I'd like. So - back to the sculpt of "Loss". I did some extra work and ultimately wasn't needed and wasn't diligent enough of photo. For instance I fully sculpted both ears - which are completely covered by the blowing hair. But sometimes you change direction with work and the ears may have shown - at the very least they are a form that takes up space under the hair, so their presence is still felt.

I also sculpted the hands and arms several times - trying to get just the right pose. The tendrils of blowing hair are tricky - casting shadows upon the face, which is fine with me, however may be a problem in casting in bronze - I'll be checking with the foundry. The costs of casting increase dramatically with extra work, so it's a delicate balance.

You'll see in the full length images that she is standing on a long base, which is her shadow. This is how the emotion of loss feels to me - engulfing and swallowing (shown by the hair and dress swirling about her) with nothing but darkness ahead - represented by the long shadow.

The shadow has a hole it in - the feeling of a hole in your heart.

Now that the forms are in place and proportions set  I will take some time to refine the entire piece and then take some photos with better lighting.

15" high by 16" long in waterbased clay.

Beginning a new figure sculpture - "Loss"

Taking a break from the ecorche piece and trying something a bit different. I am sculpting from a tiny, quick maquette that I made a couple of months ago depicting the emotion of "loss". The was before the indescribable day of Sandy Hook....but since then this sculpt has prayed on my mind. So I decided to table my work for the moment to give some attention to this.

Usually I work in either water based clay for firing or oil-based clay for mold-making and then bronze. But for this piece, I'm working with a metal armature like I would with oil-based clay, but I'm sculpting with water-based clay instead. I just really love the feel of waterbased clay and wanted to give this a go.

The tiny sketch is a oil-based clay and the enlargement that I started is a metal armature with water-based clay on it. It can't be fired -as you can't dry and fire waterbased clay with a metal armature in it. In fact, I really can't let it dry out at all, because the clay with shrink and crack and become terribly brittle. What I plan to do is have the mold-maker take a mold directly from the leather-hard clay before it dries. Then cast in bronze.


I've  not done this before - my bust of Harriet Tubman was a fired clay piece, so not fragile when making the mold. But it's good to experiment.

"Loss" as I'm doing her now stands about 15" tall and has a long shadow being cast before her - symbolic of the darkness that she's feeling. I've blocked in some of the basic forms and shapes of the anatomy and look forward to beginning the refining stage next.

Suit up!

I had loads of  fun sculpting her and even more reaction to her as a nude figure......but I always wanted to do something more with her. So this week I had a ball sculpting a nice swimsuit for her and I think this look 'suits' her very well ;-)

Since this piece was a finished fired ceramic sculpt I opted to created her clothes using an artist's two-part epoxy, Aves Apoxie Sculpt.

You simply knead together equal parts of the epoxy until well mixed. I dampened the ceramic a little before applying the epoxy and sculpting it onto the figure. There is a window of time (1-2 hours) where the epoxy is workable and it gradually becomes stiffer. When it was stiffened up to the point of being quite firm, I pressed textured cloth onto the surface to give it a texture similar to the ceramic.

Once the epoxy is cured (24 hours) I was able to patina it in the same manner as the original sculpt so it looks like the suit has always been there.
This was on my to-do list for quite some time but as I rather liked the nude sculpt and had received a good response from her as is, I was concerned about ruining, rather than improving the piece.

I must say, however, that I'm very pleased with the outcome and I plan on keeping this in mind for other projects!