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Projects: Maquettes
Aug. 30th, 2007 03:52 pmToday my maskmaking class completed their first project, which was to make polymer clay maquettes.
A maquette is a small clay model created as a guide for a larger sculpture. Since costume craft artisans interpret mask designs which are rendered in 2D by a costume designer, sketching out your ideas in clay by making maquettes can be an invaluable step in the design and construction process of mask creation. In this way, you can have a conversational exchange with the designer about size and scale of the mask in 3D and make changes on a small scale rather than a large one. You can repaint the maquette a number of different ways, too.
I had my class make small maquettes from polymer clay as their first project, to get a feel for sculpting before moving to a larger scale, and to compare how it goes sculpting a "sketch" vs the larger full-size masks they will make next. We used polymer clay because it stays malleable until you fire it, and then it's hard and paintable. (Some brand names are Sculpey and Fimo.)
( images )
A maquette is a small clay model created as a guide for a larger sculpture. Since costume craft artisans interpret mask designs which are rendered in 2D by a costume designer, sketching out your ideas in clay by making maquettes can be an invaluable step in the design and construction process of mask creation. In this way, you can have a conversational exchange with the designer about size and scale of the mask in 3D and make changes on a small scale rather than a large one. You can repaint the maquette a number of different ways, too.
I had my class make small maquettes from polymer clay as their first project, to get a feel for sculpting before moving to a larger scale, and to compare how it goes sculpting a "sketch" vs the larger full-size masks they will make next. We used polymer clay because it stays malleable until you fire it, and then it's hard and paintable. (Some brand names are Sculpey and Fimo.)
( images )
