The Hardest Piece I've Put Together
12/12/2022
Figure Modeling 1 was my first time experiencing sculpture. I came into it very daunted because it was something I had never undertaken before. I was completely new to it, and it showed. My first project in the class was sculpting a hand at about life-size. I toiled through nights trying to make it work and found the process relaxing and meditative. Despite this, the hand never looked quite right, the thing ended up looking almost robotic by the deadline. I was both proud to have completed something in a new form and medium, and disappointed in my ineptitude. Flash forward a few weeks later, and our professor gave us our final project. We were to sculpt in the surreal, it was an open-ended project that gave us free rein. As I thought about it, I instantly knew the exact topic for my final project, the human hand. A redemption arc for the poor-quality hand I had made before. But this one would be harder, at least three times more extensive, and with much more detail.
Originally my idea was huge, a hand distorted hand reaching out of water. Fingers protruding from pores in the arm and wrist of the figure. Tentacles wrapped all around it to pull it back down, etc. But as I was still new to the medium, I had to scale it down to something doable for my skill level. I landed on a larger than lifesize hand with a reptilian tentacle wrapped around it. This was way more doable, but I still had a problem, I'm still kind of bad at hands...
I started with the base, easy enough, layered clay over and over again until I got a general blockish shape.
After the general shape, I started on the palm. This step was somehow one of the more annoying parts. The weight of the palm would cause the whole structure to sag, so I had to figure out how to keep the palm stable because the weight would definitely increase over time. Then sculpting the fingers one by one.
I had to add volume to the base of the palm, to make the whole thing strong enough to take the added weight. Ended up using whatever I could get my hands on to prop it up so it wouldn't fall. After much trial and error, I was ready to stick my fingers on. This was not a fun process, a lot of falling over and rebuilding occurred. Eventually, all the fingers were on but one, and I had added enough volume to the palm for it to look proportional while also being able to take the added weight.
Putting on the final finger was awkward; nothing supported it, and the finger wasn't at an angle that would accommodate the front of my palm. There was a lot of trial and error during this entire process, but this was probably the part that took the most time, other than the tentacle. It was interesting to put my ideas to fruition. However, the process of sculpting was pretty relaxing on its own. The problem-solving element had me anxious out of my mind. Mainly, getting everything to not fall due to weight and the tentacle to stay stuck onto the hand. Often, a piece would fall off here or there, and I'd have to find some way to fix it. But that exact problem resolution made the end product that much more satisfying.
After several days of trial and error, I had finally completed the full piece. It had dried enough that I didn't need to prop it up anymore, and it could stand on its own. All that was left was hollowing, kiln, and painting. Hollowing was a bad process, I had waited too long, and the thing had dried out significantly. So instead of hollowing, it felt more like I was drilling through concrete. After that terrible process was done, it was time for the kiln, and fingers were crossed that it didn't explode, as its final FU to my sanity. Luckily it survived, and I got to paint it. This was the finished product:
