Drawings without Paper continued

The second half of the Drawings without Paper assignment was a stereotomic "drawing". I chose to do this in cast plaster. This model was thick and had a massive quality to it. The thickness of it created a very good potential to play with depth in conveying the drawing. The drawing I chose to represent was a sectional axonometric. The section was cut in a similar place to the section used for the wire drawing.

The first attempt at casting plaster was definitely a failure. The model broke while I was taking off the mold. It didn't read very well and the plaster mix was so wet that it never really dried. However, I learned a lot from making it since it was the first time I had ever cast plaster.

From there I made another mold and applied what I had learned from the previous failure. The plaster mix was still a little wet, but not nearly as bad this time around.

The cast was a lot thicker than before to accommodate the increased depth and to strengthen the rest of the cast. In the first one, some areas were so thin that they cracked if they were handled.

Some of the raised "islands" cracked on the corners as the mold was taken out of the lower areas. Also, some of the thinner pieces cracked off because the plaster was still moist when the mold was removed.

Although it looks messy when viewed straight on, it's still somewhat legible as a drawing.

The shadow lines definitely help the legibility. The cut lines were the most recessed and the darkness of the shadows created help to bring them out. Overall, the result was only satisfactory, but I learned a lot about the process and about my design through this assignment.