The Techniques Of Sculpture
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The techniques and tools of sculpture are determined to a large extent by the nature of the materials used. The most commonly sculpted substances include clay, ivory, stone, wood, and metal; in modern times plastics, steel, and found objects have offered new possibilities for sculptors. The most important sculpture techniques are carving, modeling, construction, and casting.
CARVING
As a process of shaping material by reducing its mass, carving is the most direct of all sculpture techniques. The carver removes superfluous material from such durable substances as stone, ivory, or wood to create the form and surface texture desired. The basic tools of a stone carver include various sizes and types of chisels, files, drills, gouges, and hammers. Rasps and abrasives are used to produce various surface textures and degrees of polish. Similar tools are used to work with wood and ivory as well. After making drawings and small-scale models of the statue, the artist may work directly on the block of material or use the technique of pointing. This technique is a mechanical method of reproducing a sculpture from a model by using triangulation. By using pointing, a work can be copied exactly or reduced (or enlarged) in size.
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Carving can be used to release a work completely from its background—to give it a shape in the round and make it freestanding. Carving can also be done as relief with raised figures that are never completely freed from their background. Relief sculpture varies greatly in depth, ranging from low (or bas-relief) to high relief, in which the figures are more than half emerged. An individual work can contain various levels of relief carving, for example, the Imperial Procession from the Ara Pacis (13-9 BCE) in Rome. A variant form of carving is sunken relief, a type of intaglio in which the design is cut into the background. This type of relief was developed and much favored by the ancient Egyptians.
MODELING
Modeling is a direct sculptural method that uses such pliable materials as clay, papier-mache, plaster, or wax. The suppleness of these media allows the sculptor to create complex forms by adding or subtracting material. At the same time, modeling often necessitates an armature, or inner skeleton, to hold the work together. Because of the plastic nature of the materials, in order to become permanent, the final work must be dried, cast in a more durable substance (usually metal), or fired (as clay figures are fired to become terra-cotta).
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CONSTRUCTION
A significant sculptural form of the 20th century, construction (or assemblage) is a direct technique using a variety of materials, often in combination, including plastics and other synthetics, fabric, glass, found objects, metals, and even lights. The welding of metal has become an important construction technique; rolled sheets, rods, and beams of various metal alloys are spot welded together, as in David Smith's steel and stainless-steel Hudson River Landscape. Kinetic art, especially the mobile and stabile developed by Alexander Calder, is an art form that adds an element of motion to sculpture. Made of colored pieces of metal connected by wires, mobiles such as Calder's Red Petals depend on air currents for movement. Other types of kinetic art use water, motors, or other devices to provide motion.
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CASTING
Casting is an indirect, or reproduction, technique that involves direct sculpture methods – carving, modeling, and construction—as the initial step toward the finished product. The classic method of metal casting, especially for bronzes, is the lost-wax process, also called cire perdue. In this method a clay or plaster model of the statue is coated with a layer of wax and encased in heat-resistant plaster. When the model is heated, the wax melts and runs out of vents. The molten metal is poured into the mold to replace the "lost wax." Another method of casting metal is sand-casting, but this process is more frequently used to create industrial products.
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