Made by Britta Melton
The director of the drama club at my sons’ school asked me to help evoke 1930s New York City in the auditorium for the spring production of Annie Jr. We settled on city landmarks for 2D murals, but I wanted to add something 3D. The prior year, volunteers created a revolving door for Elf Jr. to evoke Macy’s Department Store.
I slightly modified the pattern technique for animal bodies by projecting a photo of the statues onto a large piece of cardboard. This gave me the shape for the center/spine of the armature, and some outlines for the leg sections. I did some math so that the mask would be proportional to the rest of the body based on the proportions of the sculpture photos.
Reference photos were key as I built out the body, and I actually even found a close-up of the unfinished statue from the sculptor’s studio.
When I was still aiming for two lions, I alternated building the armature on each, so they were relatively matched. I used SO many recycled plastic grocery bags!
Fitting the head was pretty easy. I knew the mane would cover some of the gaps. I simply moved the cap pieces up to form a more rounded back of the head.
When I got to the mache stage, I found out I should have been pickier about my masking tape brand. Thin weight for the face and thick for the body will be my vow on my next project. Initially, I was using thin weight for the body, too. The thin masking tape started separating from the sculpture between building sessions and I had to retape a bunch I hadn’t wanted to.
My ambition didn’t match my time, but I still got one lion finished. I draped muslin for the main to imitate the smooth marble material of the original. The kids, and other audience members were awed by the scale and the realism of the face.
That was a very challenging job you volunteered for – a sculpture that large is not easy, especially if you’re working on two at a time! Getting one of them done was an amazing accomplishment, with a deadline looming! Thanks for showing it to us, and telling us how it was made. 🙂