It had been three months since I stopped working with stained glass and I was in limbo. Not knowing what to do with myself felt more and more like procrastination. Finally, the urge to create overcame the fear of the unknown and I was ready for something new. I had always wanted to try sculpting!
I needed something small for my first attempt so I chose a rabbit… for the garden… a monument to garden pests everywhere. Our main pest here in Saint John is deer but I thought that was too big for my first attempt. 😅
After watching some You Tube videos on DIY sculpting, I chose to use Styrofoam®️ as the skeletal form and then cover it in a thin layer of concrete. Polystyrene foam is light weight and easy to carve into any basic shape. To create a 3-D foam block, I stacked pieces of 2″ foam and glued them together using No More Nails glue. I found online a 3-D image of a rabbit sculpture and printed out the front, side and rear views. Then I traced those shapes onto the foam block. As it turned out, front and rear view are identical shapes… good to know for future work.
To carve out the shape, I ordered a hot wire cutter kit from Amazon. Glad to say, it worked great! The hot wire sliced through the foam like butter as the rough shape of the rabbit gradually emerged. Working in 3-D was so unfamiliar, interesting and challenging!
For the exterior covering, I used Quikrete®️ Sand Topping Mix cement, mixed it to a pasty consistency and started applying it to the foam. That was a learning process. The wet mix kept slumping as I applied it. Fortunately, Quikrete®️ sets up quickly so it soon stiffened enough to hold in place (more learning needed including different types of concrete).
Once it had dried (48 hrs), I sealed it with Minwax®️ and then painted it with as-close-as-I-could-get-to rabbit colors drawing from our inventory of old left-over-paint-cans. 😅
Albeit a bit grotesque, I think most people would recognize it as a rabbit. I certainly learned alot from the first attempt and was eager to learn more. So, before the first one was even dry, I was on to the next one. This time, a standing rabbit so the pair of them would look more natural if placed together in the garden.
I also tried another trick I learned from You Tube; soaking strips of cloth in runny thin cement mixture and wrapping them around the sculpture mold. Then when dry, the hardened wraps should form a better anchor for the concrete to come next.
I would say the wrapping technique did not greatly enhance the final piece. It added too much bulk resulting in a very chubby bunny. If it had a longer tail, it would look more like a kangaroo. 😆
Overall, it was a wonderful creative experience full of stimulated learning. Sculpting is messy work for sure but it allows me to place more art outdoors in the gardens. Although I can’t say it will be a life-long pursuit going forward, I can say I’m not done yet exploring this medium as a creative outlet.
nellyglass studio 