CREATING THE BASE

The base for this sculpture was going to be fairly traditional in style. Firstly I started off by creating a cottle (the white plastic tube form in the images below). In the centre of this cottle was a metal spindle used for attaching plaster blanks to the lathe, making sure that the base of the spindle was covered in clay. Plaster was poured into the cottle to encapsulate the spindle within the plaster,

Once the plaster had set, the cottle and clay were removed revealing the plaster blank on the spindle (below). This was left to dry out for a couple of days to make turning easier.

 Once on the lathe, the blank could be turned. The three images below show the progression of the base.

 

The plaster base was  left on my radiator to dry out fully, then I had to seal the plaster with shellac which is a type of varnish. (see image below)

 

 The plan was to put foundry letters on the plaster with Rupert's name and rank. The problem that I faced was making sure that the letters were central and evenly spaced. The solution I came up with was to draw a circle the size of the base on my work table with a line through the centre, I placed the base within the circle and was able to use the pencil line as guide for marking the plaster. I used Photoshop to produce the text guide, making sure I had a centre line marked, which I could use to line up with the pen mark on the plaster.

Below: Using the print out as a guide I was able to glue on the plastic foundry letters with P.V.A glue, checking the allignment with a steel ruler.