Certification carved pendant

The last post on my certification projects is the carved pendant. I really like this pendant and the process used to create it. In fact I taught this process in a class tonight.

I call this a double carved pendant. The first carving is done in an eraser (in class we used the easy carve block) to create a mold. After pressing PMC Standard clay into the mold, drying and sanding the piece, we carved directly into the dried clay. Since Standard clay shrinks 30% the design can be considerably bigger which makes it easy to work on. After firing, the design is sharper. Standard clay carves like butter. (PMC+ and PMC3 can also be carved but they are more difficult to carve.)

The front design was a requirement. We all carved the same design but the back was a design of our own choosing.

I had my students work up a design of their own before beginning the piece. In some ways I think this was the hardest part for them. Although, carving does take a little practice.

Oh and by the way I got my tetrahedron back from Tim today. I worried for nothing. He sent a nice little note about it.