Standing in the Shoes - William DuBose

For my sculpture I decided to carve a boat out of a bar of soap. Through the whole process I would take off a small amount of soap with a sharp knife. The key to carving is to be precise in what needs to be taken off. This is due to the fact that once it is taken off it cannot be added again. Making the lines smooth around the whole hull was difficult because of both an unsteady hand and the medium wanting to peel more off than needed. Another difficult task was to make the object as symetrical as possible. Michelangelo had amazing talents in all of these difficult abilities. The legs of "David" are smooth and all the small features of the human body are matched to almost a lifelike appearance. Getting into the small places was diffucult due to only having a single carving piece. I had to maintain the image in my mind of what the final piece should look like. This can be difficult with a starting piece that is an oval or even a block. I now have a new respect for Michelangelo for being able to do this task with a medium as unforgiving as marble.