Hobby of Sculpting – Spread Joy through Various Materials the Nature Has to Offer
Sculpting is a wonderful art that enables you to create 3-dimensional art pieces for which you can use a range of mediums. If you want to develop this hobby, the good news is that it’s very easy to start, with the requirement of a limited number of materials that are easily available. Here are various types of mediums you can start with and how-to tips.
Stone Carving
Stone sculpting dates back to thousands of years. Stone was probably chosen by pre-historic man for sculpting mainly due to its durable nature. You can start carving an idol out of a single rock or carving petroglyphs on a large slab. Petroglyphs are images formed by removing parts of a rock surface which you don’t move from its place and do the work by abrading, incising, pecking and carving.
You can even choose precious and semi-precious stones like jade, onyx, agate, carnelian, rock crystals etc for carving and engraving. Samples of such precious engravings are seen as the memories of famous personalities and dynasties like Shang Dynasty, Bernini Apollo, the Greek Venus di Milo and so on.
Bronze Sculpting and Casting
You can also choose a metal for making sculptures by casting. The most popular metal for this is bronze. A cast bronze statue is usually known as simply a “bronze”. Bronze alloys have fantastic quality of expanding slightly before getting set, thereby filling the most minute details of a mold. Also they have strength which is an advantage when action figures are to be formed, particularly as opposed to various stones like marble and ceramic materials.
Clay Sculptures
Clay is perhaps the most popular medium for sculpting. It’s inexpensive, easy to work with and easily available. It also provides a number of possibilities like glazes, firing techniques and finishes. Pottery is the most popular form of clay sculpting because of being beautiful as well as useful.
Wood Carving
Wood carving is done with a cutting tool and often used for figural carving.
Whittling is a type of wood carving that is the easiest and cheapest medium of forming something from nearly anything with a whittling knife, from walking sticks to intricate figures.
Sound Sculptures
Sound sculpture is usually an invention of a musician or composer who goes beyond to form an “interactive” artwork. This can be expressed in something as simple as a wind chime to Aeolian harp. A more advanced example is the Blackpool High Tide Organ in the UK, constructed by John Gooding and Liam Curtin. It runs on wave energy and at high tide plays through eight pipes connected to a dyke.
Thus if you are planning to develop the hobby of sculpting, there are unlimited possibilities for you. So, go ahead, start picking and spreading joy through various materials the nature has to offer!
