This clay tastes like candy! And you can play with it!
Materials Needed:
1/3 cup margarine
1/3 cup light corn syrup
¼ teaspoon salt
1 pound confectioner’s sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract, peppermint extract, or other flavoring
Mixing Spoon
Food Coloring
In a large bowl, combine margarine, light corn syrup, salt, and flavoring. Mix well. Slowly add the confectioner’s sugar. Stir until your mixture looks like clay.
Divide the edible clay into 4 or more balls and add a few drops of food coloring to each ball. Kneed the food coloring into the clay until the color is spread evenly. Make each ball a different color.
Now you’re ready to create a masterpiece. When you’ve finished, enjoy eating your sculpture.
If you have any extra clay, place each ball into a different Ziplock bag and keep in the refrigerator until next time. After two weeks, throw away the left over clay.
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Friday, September 21, 2007
Thursday, September 20, 2007
Lost Wax Casting
On Tuesday you read about Edgar Degas’ Little Dancer, Age Fourteen. After Degas died his family made bronze copies (casts) of his original sculpture. Many people wonder how a sculpture could be created out of bronze, a hard metal. Even when an artist intends the final work of art to be made out of bronze he still begins with a clay sculpture. (Degas used waxed for Little Dancer, Age Fourteen. His family would have skipped a few steps of this process.)
First, the artist creates the sculpture out of clay. Then he pours either rubber or plaster over the sculpture to create a mold. When the clay is pulled out, the hollow area is a copy the original sculpture.
Next, wax is poured into the mold, creating a copy of the sculpture in wax. The artist must perfect any detail that didn’t come out right in the wax cast. Another layer of wax is poured over the cast to create a new hollow copy of the sculpture. Since Degas’ sculpture was made out of wax, his family would have started here when making bronze casts.
This hollow wax shell is covered with a fireproof material called an investment. When the investment has hardened, the wax is melted away. Into the investment, the artist pours the melted bronze. Once the bronze has cooled and hardened, the investment is broken and pulled away leaving the bronze cast.
All that is left to do now is clean up the cast and fix anything that didn’t come out of the invested smoothly. Often this means smoothing out seams and fixing small details such as eyes or fingernails.
First, the artist creates the sculpture out of clay. Then he pours either rubber or plaster over the sculpture to create a mold. When the clay is pulled out, the hollow area is a copy the original sculpture.
Next, wax is poured into the mold, creating a copy of the sculpture in wax. The artist must perfect any detail that didn’t come out right in the wax cast. Another layer of wax is poured over the cast to create a new hollow copy of the sculpture. Since Degas’ sculpture was made out of wax, his family would have started here when making bronze casts.
This hollow wax shell is covered with a fireproof material called an investment. When the investment has hardened, the wax is melted away. Into the investment, the artist pours the melted bronze. Once the bronze has cooled and hardened, the investment is broken and pulled away leaving the bronze cast.
All that is left to do now is clean up the cast and fix anything that didn’t come out of the invested smoothly. Often this means smoothing out seams and fixing small details such as eyes or fingernails.
I have created an illustration of the process of lost wax casting which you can find below.
This is not something you could do at home. In fact, many artists send the hollow wax mold to a professional rather than melt and pour the bronze themselves.
Wednesday, September 19, 2007
Create Your Own Clay Sculpture
You’ve already learned how Degas created Little Dancer, Age Fourteen by molding wax onto a wire frame. You’ve also learned about Michelangelo chipping away at a block of stone until David appeared. Now you can make your own sculpture using the clay recipe below. This is a very simple recipe but make sure to ask a parent before you start.
Materials Needed:
2 Cups Flour
1 Cup Salt
1 Cup Water
1 ½ Tbsp Vegetable Oil
Optional Materials:
Paints
Paintbrushes
Craft Sealant
Mix the dry ingredients in a bowl. Slowly stir in the water and the oil until there are no more lumps. The mixture should be smooth. That’s all there is to it; you have homemade clay. I recommend setting up sheets of wax paper to sculpt on because the clay won’t stick to it. It will also protect your work space. If you use newspaper, the black ink will show up in your clay. You could also just sprinkle the table with flour to prevent sticking.
When you’ve finished your masterpiece, place it on a cookie sheet and bake at 250 degrees for about fifty minutes. Once the sculpture has cooled, you can paint it if you’d like. When the paint has dried, if you love your sculpture, paint it with a craft sealant. This will preserve the paint over time and give it a shiny appearance.
Keep any left-over dough in a plastic bag to keep it from drying out.
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Materials Needed:
2 Cups Flour
1 Cup Salt
1 Cup Water
1 ½ Tbsp Vegetable Oil
Optional Materials:
Paints
Paintbrushes
Craft Sealant
Mix the dry ingredients in a bowl. Slowly stir in the water and the oil until there are no more lumps. The mixture should be smooth. That’s all there is to it; you have homemade clay. I recommend setting up sheets of wax paper to sculpt on because the clay won’t stick to it. It will also protect your work space. If you use newspaper, the black ink will show up in your clay. You could also just sprinkle the table with flour to prevent sticking.
When you’ve finished your masterpiece, place it on a cookie sheet and bake at 250 degrees for about fifty minutes. Once the sculpture has cooled, you can paint it if you’d like. When the paint has dried, if you love your sculpture, paint it with a craft sealant. This will preserve the paint over time and give it a shiny appearance.
Keep any left-over dough in a plastic bag to keep it from drying out.
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Tuesday, September 18, 2007
Degas' Little Dancer, Age Fourteen
When Edgar Degas sculpted Little Dancer, Age Fourteen, he meant to change the way people viewed beauty. He didn’t sculpt a tall, slender ballerina out of sleek clay. Instead he chose a young dancer who hadn’t yet grown into her womanly figure. He chose a dancer who was still learning and struggling to become a star. Then he molded her in resting pose rather than in the middle of a complicated but beautiful maneuver.
The little ballerina looks tired because she probably was. Many ballerinas during Degas’ time were very poor and studied ballet as a way out of the slums. This was the case with the model Degas used for Little Dancer, Age Fourteen. Her name was Marie Van Goethem. Though she was fired from the dance company when she was seventeen and never became the star she wished to be, Degas’ sculpture has made her a recognized figure all over the world. When the sculpture was shown to the public during the 6th Impressionist Exhibition in Paris in 1881, many thought it was ugly, though some understood that Degas was trying to show beauty in truth. Today, the sculpture is loved my many.
Degas created Little Dancer, Age Fourteen by layering yellow wax over a wire frame. When he had completed the sculpture he added real ballet slippers, which he covered with a thin layer of wax, real hair tied with a ribbon, a bodice made of linen, and a muslin tutu. He thought the sculpture would have disintegrated before he died and, in fact, many of his wax sculptures were broken and falling apart when he died. Degas’ heirs quickly cast the wax sculpture in bronze, making many copies. The original wax sculpture no longer exists. Today, many museums have bronze casts of Degas’ sculpture, Little Dancer, Age Fourteen. The one shown here stands in the Musee d’Orsay in Paris, France. Also in the case, notice the smaller sculpture which was a study for Little Dancer, Age Fourteen.
Check back tomorrow for a homemade clay recipe. You can make a sculpture, too!
Return to main page.
The little ballerina looks tired because she probably was. Many ballerinas during Degas’ time were very poor and studied ballet as a way out of the slums. This was the case with the model Degas used for Little Dancer, Age Fourteen. Her name was Marie Van Goethem. Though she was fired from the dance company when she was seventeen and never became the star she wished to be, Degas’ sculpture has made her a recognized figure all over the world. When the sculpture was shown to the public during the 6th Impressionist Exhibition in Paris in 1881, many thought it was ugly, though some understood that Degas was trying to show beauty in truth. Today, the sculpture is loved my many.
Degas created Little Dancer, Age Fourteen by layering yellow wax over a wire frame. When he had completed the sculpture he added real ballet slippers, which he covered with a thin layer of wax, real hair tied with a ribbon, a bodice made of linen, and a muslin tutu. He thought the sculpture would have disintegrated before he died and, in fact, many of his wax sculptures were broken and falling apart when he died. Degas’ heirs quickly cast the wax sculpture in bronze, making many copies. The original wax sculpture no longer exists. Today, many museums have bronze casts of Degas’ sculpture, Little Dancer, Age Fourteen. The one shown here stands in the Musee d’Orsay in Paris, France. Also in the case, notice the smaller sculpture which was a study for Little Dancer, Age Fourteen.Check back tomorrow for a homemade clay recipe. You can make a sculpture, too!
Return to main page.
Monday, September 17, 2007
Michelangelo's Sistine Chapel Ceiling
After spending the last few days recovering, I'm feeling much better. As promised, an article about the Sistine Chapel ceiling, painted by Michelango from 1508-1512.
Today the massive fresco that covers the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel in the Vatican in Italy is one of the best known pieces of art in the world, but Michelangelo didn’t want to paint it. Michelangelo preferred sculpting but he couldn’t say no to the Pope. So in 1508 he began his work.
Of course he couldn’t reach the ceiling from the ground, so he attached wooden platforms to the walls to stand on. Each day he had to lay new plaster onto the ceiling to paint on. It must have been unpleasant work because plaster becomes hot as it dries and it smells. Michelangelo worked on the ceiling for 4 years.
The design of the ceiling is shown in the drawing above. (Image from Wikipedia.) The middle strip of the ceiling is divided into nine different paintings, each showing a story from the book of Genesis. Five of the nine are 
small pictures surrounded by shields and nudes, and the other four are larger pictures without nudes in the corners. These nine pictures can be placed in groups of three panels. The first group shows God creating the earth. This picture shown on the left, God Creating Adam, is from this group. The second group shows the creation of man and woman. The third group is all about Noah, including the great flood.
On either side of the center row of pictures, Michelangelo painted prophets and sibyls, twelve altogether. Each were in some way involved with the coming of Jesus Christ. There are seven men (prophets) and five women (sibyls).
Between the prophets are triangular shaped areas, and over the windows are arches. Onto these areas Michelangelo painted Christ’s ancestors and family.
Finally, in the four corners of the ceiling, Michelangelo painted four more stories from the bible. One shows David defeating Goliath (shown below), a subject Michelangelo had already sculpted.
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