Working with terracotta with the supervision of Graham Bowes[Joinery and Metal] Technician

After looking at the work of Henry Moore i was inspired to create another sculpture. This time with the advice of Graham Bowes. I created a two piece waste mold.

Henry Moore, Baby's Head 1926

To make my sculpture I placed two half bricks and pieces of roof tiles to form the body . Then using terrocotta, I coverd these.

After hours of manipulating the terracotta, and forming the hand and wrist below to look like part boxing glove with fingers coming out below, I went home and thought about what I had done and realised that it would be impossible for the thum nail to be in that position.

After studying my own fingers and hand, I made adjustments to the nail on the thumb to make it more realistic.

The next stage was to cover the terracotta with plaster, firstly, doing one side, then the other. I had to wait until the plaster was set, then submerge the old sructure in water for the terracoota to loosen, before removing it from the inside of the cast.

The next part of the operation was to fix the 2 sides together, ensuring it was strong enough to have concrete poured into it. Firstly, we had to use slip to coat the inside to ensure that when the concrete was poured it would not stick to the plaster. When mixing the concrete, we used a cement dye to give the boxing glove colour. When I was a bricklayer, I used to put a silver coin into every job I finished, so I decided to put a 10 pence piece at the base of my sculpture.

At this point, I had to cover the sculpture and leave it for 3 days to set.

This is the finished product in its raw state. I have called this piece the Gov'nor because of its strong undertones.