Skip to main content

Art Doll: Nest Eggs


During the Easter weekend, I have been doing some" catch up" work, completing some orders and finishing a little art doll I started a week ago as well as eating a chocolate Easter egg or two and going out to dinner  and movies with friends  - perfect weekend!  Here is my little Forest Friend, rescuing a nest of eggs at Easter... and here are the basic steps:
1. Have a good friend to inspire, motivate and help...
Bobbi (Lambo Art) explaining anatomy and armature
2. Make an armature from wire and check the proportions against an anatomy chart.
Wire armature, secured with insulation tape.  
3. Flesh out the armature by covering with lots of  aluminium foil.
Armature covered with foil  
4. Make foil bases/ armatures for head, hands and feet
Foil armatures 
5. Cover and sculpt with polymer clay. I used Sculpey" Living Doll" and I made two pairs of hands because the first lot looked like lobster claws!   Cure in an oven at 130 degrees C for 30 -40 minutes.
Sculpted pieces ready for the oven. 
6. Colour the pieces.  I used acrylic paints, powdered pastels and chalks and wax rubs. I also sanded the face a little to smooth out a few wrinkles I didn't want - I did leave a few.
Head : first colouring. 
7. Put the body together.  The hands and feet and head fit onto the wire armature. I also added and stitched a thin layer of batting to the foil armature, and then another stretch layer of underwear ( like a skin) - I used a sock.
Work in progress ; layer of batting, and"underwear". 
8. Now that the doll's personality is beginning to make itself clear, add some clothing. I intended this doll to be a Russian woman like a babushka, but he wanted to be a little forest friend, a bird lover and protector. All the clothes are recycled from old bits and pieces, discarded jumpers and scraps of fabric.
Clothes from re-purposed jumpers and fabric scraps. 
9. Make accessories. In this case,  this forest friend has rescued a birds' nest , so I made a nest from painted and textured wire and some birds' eggs from polymer clay (a mixture of translucent, turquoise, and pearl white Premo Sculpey) .
Nest and eggs 
10, Straighten out the wire limbs and pose the doll  to stand up on its own.
Whatever your beliefs are, I hope your  Easter weekend was filled with peace, love, laughter and creativity.
Labels:

Comments

  1. AnonymousApril 9, 2012 at 2:45 PM

    Thank you so much for your detail on how to make art doll ive been looking around for a while how to make a doll like this.
    I will get busy now.
    Cheers Lyn xxx

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Thanks for reading my blog and please share your thoughts about my blog post by leaving a comment.Your comment won't appear immediately as comments are verified before publication in an effort to reduce the amount of spam appearing. Anonymous comments will not be published.

Popular posts from this blog

Gourd Art

Last week, I rediscovered a few gourds "drying" in our garage... In fact, I was searching for them after doing a doll making workshop where we transformed gourds into doll bodies, with the addition of polymer clay and apoxie sculpt.  I have researched a little to identify the gourds I have - they seem closest to the water jug shape gourds. The gourds we used in the workshop were Chinese bottle gourds.  my gourd doll - a flower child /hippy fiddler?  Workshop dolls - Christmas sprite by Jane Lambert , and my doll  Flower doll also completed in the workshop by Lee Hennequin  Balloon seller - gourd art doll by tutor, Janice Laurent  Working with gourds made me very curious about the history and cultivation of gourds. A  gourd   is a plant of the family  Cucurbitaceae  or the fruit of the two genera of "calabash tree" .  The term refers to a number of species and subspecies, many with hard shells, and some witho...
1 comment
Read more

Countdown to Christmas 15 - Diamonds Forever!

How much would you pay for a Christmas  fruitcake?  The world's most expensive fruit cake has been estimated at $1.65 million. Yesterday, I wrote about the less than positive term "Christmas cake as it is applied to unmarried women, so again it amazed me that  in Tokyo, this most exquisite and expensive Christmas cake was created. It took six months to design and another full month to construct. The beautiful cake is fully edible ... that is except for the 223  real diamonds  used as decoration. This cake was part of an exhibition called Diamonds: Nature's Miracle  and was one of 16 exhibits showcasing creative ways with diamonds . Apparently, the cake was auctioned, fetching $1.65 million US. While there have been other very expensive diamond encrusted cakes since this one in 2005 with estimated values of up to $75 million, this Japanese designed cake was the forerunner of the extravagant diamond studded wedding cakes in the higher price r...
Post a Comment
Read more

Christmas Countdown 3 ; Christmas tree # 23 - Mannequins and Motors

Mannequin   and Mercedes Benz logo Christmas trees  Advent Blog Day 23 - Mannequins and Motors ... or... What does a Mannequin have in common with a Mercedes Benz?   I have been in such a dilemma as I have so few days left and so many Christmas trees I want to feature.  So, in the spirit of balance today, I've combined a couple of categories into the theme of Mannequins and Motors -   winsome wonders and winning wheels ....  Mannequin and motor oil   Christmas trees  Hubcaps and Mannequin Christmas trees  Not satisfied with auto parts? Decorate with the whole car....  Mannequin and Mini Cooper cars Christmas trees  And tyres seem to be a popular choice and somehow they go beautifully with these 'green' mannequin trees...  Tyres and red ribbons  Tyres and baubles on mannequin Christmas trees  Red bird  wire form and sparkly tyres  Ch...
Post a Comment
Read more