5th grade Weeks 6&7: Foil Figures

Our last step is to take our 2-D sketches and turn them into 3-D sculptures! We're going to be using aluminum foil to create our posed figures! Let's get started.

This is my finished example for my Giacometti inspired figure sculpture. Don't worry if your idea ends up changing from your original sketch, mine totally did, but I love it!

Don't forget that like Alberto Giacometti's work, our figures will reference the proportions of an actual person but end up being slightly exaggerated. My figures are similar to his in that they are a little slender in several areas. That's fine!

Don't get too caught up in trying to make these figures match a human's proportions. We should be able to tell they're people and know in general what they're doing.

Getting started

All you need to get started is some aluminum foil. You'll see in my example video that I draw on my aluminum foil with a permanent marker. You can do this if it helps you figure out where your cut lines should go but know you may see some of your lines in your finished piece. Watch the video below to see how to get started with your sculpture

Guide to Beginning

Remember, your sketches should all have 3 characters in it so we can see how you incorporate the idea of space into your sculpture. Are the figures close and gathered or are they separate like Giacometti's figures are typically spaced? Follow your plan or change it up as you start creating your figures and trying to create your poses.

The guide to the right shows you the cuts that I like to make to create my figures. Don't forget, instead of doing two cuts on the left and two cuts on the right you can meet in the middle and do a single cut instead. As you form the legs and arms, your torso will be created in between.

If you want to create a smaller figure you still want your aluminum to be longer than it is wide. So all you need to do is rip off a piece of aluminum that is short. If you only pull 7-8 inches off of the roll than you'll end up with a much smaller rectangle to work with, and you won't have wasted any aluminum foil! Feel free to create figures of different sizes!

If you planned on creating additional objects and they are too hard to make out of foil alone use cardboard, and then just cover it with foil to make it cohesive!

Use whatever you want for the base, just make sure you have an idea of how big it needs to be to hold all of your figures before you put any work into covering/painting it. If it is small enough and you want to change the color you could also glue a sheet of paper to it and that would create a clean base for you to glue or tape your figures onto.

Adding some dimension

I know the pieces are already 3 dimensional at this point but to add extra interest and dimension to the piece I'm sharing an optional addition. Take your sculpture outside or put it by a really bright lamp. Do you see shadows from all of your figures on your base?

Grab a pencil and trace the shadows! Lightly shade them in, in pencil. This will help add to the 3 dimensional aspect of your work by having a permanent shadow on your piece!

Turning a piece into a sculpture usually turns out to be a little harder and more time consuming than most people realize. Because of that I'm giving you two weeks to complete this project. When your project is done, post a final image for me on Seesaw!

I can't wait to see what everyone does, and hope you have fun creating your sculptures!