Did you ever think that you would be reminded of sculpting tools while at the dentist's office or in your kitchen? How about when you used to play with Play-Doh? Sculpture tools, used to mold and cut, often resemble objects that can be found in everyday life.
Sculpting tools come in many forms, shapes, and sizes, with many different tools for whatever the material being sculpted.
Sculptors using an already hard material, such as marble or limestone, carve their design out rather than adding to it. Artists such as Michelangelo are very skilled at this technique, though it requires a great deal of patience and concentration. They must use a chisel to break apart the preexisting material to create a sculpture. The material is usually very costly. For the purpose of this article, we will focus on sculpting tools for clay, as they are more universal.
Many sculpting tools are for molding and cutting clay. Clay is a very popular material to create a sculpture from as it is inexpensive and abundant. There are many types of clay a sculptor can use, but two very popular ones are boneware and claystone. Boneware is great clay to use for busts and heads, as it can be kept soft as long as the artist desires. By covering it with a damp cloth, the clay will remain pliable, but when left to dry, it will become bone-hard. Claystone is plastic clay that also air dries hard. It is very durable and does not need to be baked in a kiln.
When using clay, there are several sculpting tools able to cut and mold the raw clay before it is dried or fired (these are the tools that look like the ones your dentist uses to clean your teeth). There are two different categories: carvers and smoothers. Carvers are used to trim and shape the clay cleanly and easily, and can be used to etch designs into the raw clay. Some are shaped like little blades, others are shaped like long straight pins, and some are triangular or circular wires on the end of a wooden handle. Some are double ended wire tools with a differently shaped wire on each side. The smoothers are often made from wood and are best used on heads and busts to make the skin appear soft without lines or creases.
Artists who use clay have several sculpting tools they can use to aid them in creating their masterpiece. One is a turntable, which is a round rotating table used by the artist to work on the sculpture from all sides without constantly moving it. A more advanced version of the turntable is a potter’s wheel, which is basically a mechanical turntable. The clay can be placed on the circular platform which rotates by pressing a foot pedal. The clay can then be manipulated into a defined shape, such as a vase or bowl.
Several of the helpful sculpting tools are not found in your average home. One helpful sculpting tool is a pugmill. If you think of the clay as Play Doh, then the pugmill is the spaghetti maker from the Play Doh set. The clay goes into a small chamber and when a handle is pushed down the clay is pressed and squeezed through the machine into coils of various sizes. The coils are shaped like large spaghetti noodles and are easy to build up into a vase, bust, or other designs.
Another sculpting tool that may not be found at home is a kiln. It is a room or chamber that is basically a large oven. Kilns are used to harden the clay to create ceramics in a process called firing the clay. Home ovens are usually unable to reach the high temperatures of a kiln.
Just like any job, artists use tools to aid them in creating a sculpture. These tools help add shape and dimension. Whether it looks like a tooth cleaner or a double wire end tool depends on who you ask.
