Standing in the Shoes - Alison Jungfleisch

I truly have only this to say: I severely underestimated the difficulty and frustration that would ensue when I undertook this project. I would go so far as to say, and I will quote the 43rd President on this, that I mis-underestimated sculpting. Though I would never claim to be an artist, and I think my sculpture only provides testament to this, I feel as though this process has given me a deeper understanding of the artistic mind.
Now not claiming to be an artist doesn’t mean that I’ve had no experience. I took high school art classes, but that was child’s play. We made crude paintings, collages, line drawings, etc.; but nothing prepared me for the undertaking of sculpture. I have never had the experience of attempting to draw shape in a three dimensional way from a stone (or in this case soap). There was much trial and error, with significant emphasis on error, and nearly half a dozen bars of soap were ruined as I attempted to grasp the technique of sculpting (in the picture you'll notice the pile of soap shavings behind my finished product). When I first sat down at the kitchen table with my bars of soap, my spirits where high; “I can do this, no problem,” I thought so foolishly.
I spent the next hour mutilating bar after bar of soap. I tried first to make rudimentary shapes, discovering that making a simple pyramid or cube where far more difficult tasks then I had presumed. Then finally, when I felt I had grasped the basics, using slow deliberate chips with my knife, rather than the broad strokes I had began with, I undertook my most ambitious plan. I was going to sculpt a bust, or lose a finger trying. Each undertaking was even more difficult than the last; from shaping the head, to crafting the shoulders, carving out what was meant to be a manly chest (but looked more like crossed arms), delicately chipping away his face to create a nose and eyes. My meager block of soap gave way to the figure of a man, or at least the best interpretation of the male form as my limited skills would allow.
In the end my bust, that of “Macho Man” as he was affectionately named by my fiancé, looked more like an Easter Island statue than a man; but I was proud of him/it. Spending nearly an hour to carefully and purposely carve each intimate detail gave me a connection with my creation I had not experienced before; and allowed me to better appreciate the finished product. No matter how much he failed to resemble the creation I had set out to make, I think my Macho Man is beautiful.