Sculpture and three-dimensional work
Art & Design · Key Stage 2 · The School
Adding and taking away
There are two ways to make a solid form. ADDITIVE builds it up — coiling clay, modelling, assembling, casting. SUBTRACTIVE cuts it away — carving wood, stone or soap. The difference matters practically: additive lets you undo a decision, subtractive does not, so carving is planned and modelling can be argued with as you go.
Why it falls over, and the armature
A tall or thin form cannot support its own weight in soft material. An ARMATURE is a hidden skeleton — wire, rolled newspaper, a stick — that carries the load while the material sits around it. Sculptors have always used them. If a model keeps sagging, the answer is almost never more material; it is a support inside.
It has no front
A drawing has one viewpoint. A sculpture has infinite ones, and the test is simple: turn it and look. If the back is unresolved it is not finished, and if it only works from one angle it is a relief rather than a sculpture in the round. Photograph it from four sides — the camera is unsentimental about the side you avoided.
Model a standing figure in clay with no armature: within an hour the legs sag and the arms droop, and it may snap at the ankles as it dries. Now bend a wire skeleton, wrap it loosely, and build the same figure over it. The pose holds, and it holds while drying. No amount of skill fixes the first version — the weight of clay is more than clay can carry. Armatures are engineering.