Muddy Monday: Love and Light

From now through at least BreyerFest, this blog will experiment with a weekly short feature, each Monday. If you like what you see, and want to see weekly posts continue, just click Join or Follow By Email at the bottom of the screen, and "Like" Muddy Hoofprints or "Share" the link on your own Facebook. These are the best ways that I can tell results of this post frequency experiment.

May 6 Muddy Monday: Love and Light

This Hagen-Renaker-owned mold "Forever Amber" was custom glazed by the original sculptor, Maureen Love, for her personal collection. The model now resides in the collection of Jo Ellen Arnold, acquired from the estate auctions of week 24 (week of November 6, 2005). At first glance, this Forever Amber is a solid black stoneware-glaze finish model. Holding her in my hands, I could see a significant amount of detail and more colors, in fanciful swipes of glaze.

Using a photo cube tent, this is what she looked like standing:

When I laid her down in the center of the cube, with the light sources on her belly and spine, this is how she looked:

The painterly application of glazes makes this an Impressionistic rendition of a black horse hair coat. It is interesting how the artist used stains for shadow, and opaque color glazes to control the appearance and location of highlights. 

If you ever have a doubt about photographing a solid black model, you might try this angle. I don't know if it would work terribly well on glossy black, but matte or satin should yield similar results. Just look how much visual information the camera missed, when the model was standing upright!

Check out the detail in the brushstrokes on the face and in the eye:

Much thanks to Jo Ellen Arnold for sharing her model with the blog audience, and for her assistance in photography!