Sculpture Journey and Playing With Fire

Jan 6

*This is a paper clay bas relief sculpted portrait of my own horse Remi. WIP. 4” x 4”, on Aquabord.*

Childhood delight. I think this might be foundational to my satisfaction in creating art.
I was obsessed with animals, especially horses, though I didn’t even start riding till I was 14 years old (thanks to my dad who worked off the cost of my lessons by helping at the riding stables with manual labour and later I worked there, leading trail rides and mucking stalls)

I was also obsessed with capturing animals in realistic and at least somewhat accurate form using whatever came to hand.

The most delightful media was Plasticine. Shaping, squeezing, pulling off and adding on the plasticine and seeing the formless blobs take on the form of the horse in my hands was just so amazing to me.

Mostly though I worked in pencils, then inks and watercolours as I grew up. And somehow I could never really believe that I could actually sell my work. Even when people asked to buy my work I didn’t connect this to being able to make a business and life from making and selling the work of my hands and heart. I took commissions for years. To the point that I could barely imagine making work just to please myself.

It took a few years to begin to break free of that limited thought process. But I’m getting there!

Wolf and Bear are part of my Story series. They capture symbolic representations of two of my four kids. More are in process - in my mind for now! My goal is to use my bronze metal clay to cast from my original molds and make a series of bronze animal story pendants. I’ve been working on a custom way to frame them for display when not being worn.

These days I’m letting myself explore sculpting in paper clay, ceramic clay, metal clay and I hope to work with jewelers wax this year. I’m still a bit obsessed with sculpting tiny wearable art works that will become heirlooms passed along to many generations.

Of course my main subject is horses! There is so much to explore, so much to learn! There will be many animals and also landscapes to join them!
There are so many stories to tell. So much symbolic language to reveal in physical form!

This hand sculpted fine silver pendant of a wild-spirited horse is probably my favourite piece thus far in my sculpture journey. From the flare of nostrils to wild mane and proud neck, the textures, shadows and sheen, this piece captures my heart in silver. I hope you like it too!

*My tiny wolf portrait sculpture in ceramic clay.*

I’m exploring casting my work into a variety of media, from hydrocal (an archival gypsum cement), ceramic clay, paper clay to metals. I have a bronze casting kit to experiment with sand casting and some bronze metal casting grain. Playing with fire and coming out with art is perhaps a new obsession! Who’s with me?

I don’t quite have a favourite sculpture medium just yet. Each type of clay has certain properties that make it appealing to work with and also some limitations. So far I think I love ceramic clay for the easy capture of detail and how easy it is to change. I’d love to work in porcelain clay as its an even finer texture. I also really love the fine silver metal clay. Super fine capture of detail and an incredible transformation process to its finished form. I wonder if working in wax then having it cast into metal will be as satisfying?

As to my goals: fully dimensional sculpture is the adventure I wish to take. It’ll be fascinating and challenging I’m sure.

I’ll be trying to keep a record of my efforts and work here in my Studio Stories and send the curated blog posts out to my Studio Friends so they can easily pick which ones to read.

I’ll also send my shop updates to my Studio Friends first.

I try to keep my email art letter pretty brief. Sign up below - and I welcome your replies!

Cheers!

~ Renée