Mold work on the Home of the Innocents Sculptures

The sculpture entitled "Ascension" is the first to get a mold applied. Here is the finished sculpture.

The various parts of the sculpture, arms, babies arms and legs and dove get cut apart. This is so each section can be made into a two part mold. A mold release is then sprayed on.Two coats of Polygel 40 applied with paint brushes and now Don draws on a part line - this is where the two parts of the mold will separate. Steve McMillen helps Don by fitting shims to the Dove after applying the first coats of mold materialThe part line half-way down the body. Shims will be attached to the sculpture with polygel 40 combined with polyfiber which thickens it.

The shims are applied. This is plastic bubble sheet which can be purchased from Sculpture Depot in Loveland, Colorado. The bubble sheet was waxed with Trewax prior to use so that the mold material won't stick to it.

The baby's shims.
The sculptures will get approximately 6 coats of mold material.

When the sculptures are completely coated in Polygel, they get a plaster mold which is called a mother mold. The polygel captures the surface of the clay - even fingerprints, while the mother mold provides the basic support for the rubber mold. Without it, the polygel mold would distort.

After drying, the plaster and polygel molds are removed from the clay. Each 2 part section of the sculpture will then be taped back together and readied for shipping to the Foundry - Art Castings of Loveland Colorado.
Duct tape that baby!
The mold for the baby gets taped up and the bottom of the woman sculpture is turned upside down so that the inside of the skirt can be finished. It's much easier to finish this way than lying on my back reaching up inside....

Recently, my cousin Joe Marsh came to visit (he is on the right). My sister Liz is in the middle hidden behind her daughter Bethh, and her son Joey is in the red shirt. Joe, Liz and I (on left) were great friends as kids - we grew up together and went everywhere together. But as we reached adulthood, we kind of went our separate ways, but nows he's back, kind of like a long lost brother.

On Monday May 11, Liz's other son, Danny, had his 17th birthday. We celebrated at Fuji's, a Japanese restaurant in Louisville. Those are onion volcanoes.

The chef throws a ball of rice to Danny. Will he catch it? -----Actually he does!

Fireworks in honor of Danny's birth - a family tradition.

Danny blows out the candles.
In the next post I will show the quarry where I bought the stone for the Reading Girl for Charles City Iowa. It was selected for me by the quarry owner Steve Reed of Reed Quarries. It is an excellent block that I am looking forward to carving. More pics including the turning of a ledge in the next blog posting.