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Friday, February 11, 2011

Sculpture and St Francis -Molding Making 1

"Every sculptor begins as a god and ends as a slave." Michaelangelo

Well, perhaps not a slave, certainly a housekeeper. Every inch of sculpture must be overseen before making the mold. First the design is finalized. Shown here with the new corrections in white.
 Because the Autoclaved Areated Concrete is full of holes, the entire surface of the sculpture must be sealed. I use diluted drywall compound. Water is added, the mix is stirred until I get a heavy cream consistancy.

First coat of slurry goes on.

 The trick is to work the slurry into the holes and fill them without building up brush marks or adding too much material

Face after two applications of slurry. Plenty of texture and no holes.
More in the next post.


3 comments:

Susan Gallacher-Turner said...

Very interesting...is there a risk to losing detail?

patrickgracewood said...

Yes, Susan, there is. That's why it's better to make several passes, waiting for each to dry, with a thin slurry than to try to hurry the process with a thicker mixture which could bury the low spots.

John M. Casteline said...

Patrick,
I really, really like the St. Francis statue. The pose is unique and interesting. (I happen to be a great fan of St. Francis).