Mold Making

Mold Making Artist Statement 

At the start of my process, rather than sketching out an idea, I let my hands sketch with clay. While “sketching,” I continued to think about mass-produced items that I would see in different settings and instantly, I thought back to when I saw a pair of duck decoys floating in the pond behind Zaxby’s on Highway US-1. I proceeded to sculpt my decoy mallard duck out of clay.  

I made a mold of my clay duck using a silicone mold making kit, wrapping the silicone around the duck until fully covered. Once dry, the mold was cut down the middle to reveal the details of the duck and so, once pressed together again, plaster could be poured in the mold for copies of the duck to be made. I made three plaster ducks with this mold and painted them to resemble a mallard duck decoy. 

There is an irony in making multiples of something already mass-produced—a decoy duck is used by hunters or for decoration. There must be a reason why so many of one thing is needed in terms of mass-production, but I had to ask myself why I wanted to “mass”-produce an impression of an item in which its purpose is already to be an impression of a duck. I concluded that these decoys are a familiar sight to see, even more so than an actual mallard duck. When sculpting and painting, my reference picture was not a real duck, but a decoy. Here, I sensed a disconnect to what is natural. My plaster ducks sitting atop a fake pond painted on canvas are like plastic decoy ducks floating a man-made pond behind a fast-food restaurant. Their environment matches each other, yet both are disconnected from nature.