Sculpture Update

Here we are at the end of another week, and I have another sculpture update for you!

I think she's coming along pretty well! This week, I added her hair and refined her cheeks and chin a bit more. As I was working to add more fullness to the cheeks, I was suddenly hit by the fact that the piece is really starting to look like my little niece. With this being my first sculpture ever, I never really thought it would resemble her at all. Bob is truly a gifted artist and teacher.

I took this photo right before I had to cut off the top of her head, pull out the newspaper, and begin hollowing her out. That was very traumatic! It reminded me a bit of cleaning out a Halloween pumpkin.

My class is almost over already! I think I need to sign up for the next one too, because I am loving this sculpture thing. It's such a different process from making pottery, which requires so much time management. With clay sculpting, you just keep working it until it looks right, and you can always carve things off and replace them with new clay, because you don't have to worry about the piece cracking in the firing and being ruined. Bob showed us how most of the sculptures will crack in the kiln, but they can be repaired with various fillers and fixed right up. This is a totally radical notion to a potter like me!