How was it made? Donatello's marble carving technique | V&A
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- Опубліковано 22 тра 2024
- Sculptor Simon Smith tells us why marble is 'the Emperor of all stones' and 'like a slice of the moon', as he recreates a panel from the 15th-century Prato Pulpit in Italy. The carved pulpit features metre-high dancing cherubs, which Simon copies from photographs - scaling them down to fit his block of marble, while retaining the spirit and joy of Donatello's original.
Watch the shapes appear as Simon uses different chisels and tools to cut and refine the marble, explaining how carving is all about trapping shadows and watching light play across the surface.
You can see - and touch - the panel made by Simon in our exhibition Donatello: Sculpting the Renaissance.
00:00 The properties of marble
00:26 What is the Prato Pulpit?
01:09 Drawing from photographs
01:56 Traditional vs contemporary chisels
03:16 The difficulties of marble carving
04:22 The claw tool
04:42 Trapping shadows and playing with light
05:29 Filing and pumicing
06:24 The spirit and joy of Donatello’s carving
Find out more about the exhibition and book tickets: www.vam.ac.uk/exhibitions/don...
More 'How was it Made?' films: • How was it made? - Розваги
I could listen to Simon talk about his art and his craft for ever! What a beautiful process. The phrase 'carving is essentially trapping shadows' will stay with me!
That's why speaking is so important. Not everyone knows how to put their thoughts into words. Just like explaining your emotions to another, do they understand, can they comprehend? To teach another how to explain their feelings is so important to enhance our lives.
I can but concur, a very pleasant and inspirational narrator. That phrase, furthermore, is really an epitome of the art.
Yes that really resonated with me really meant something to me
It is always a wonderful thing, to touch the mind of an artist.
That sounds messy and extremely dangerous to the artist.
Always wash your hands first.
Artists like this really make the world special.
“Capturing shadow”. Love this so much! More of these, please!
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"Trapping" I know, I loved that
@@vamuseumAre there any health problems from the marble dust that a sculptor inhales during the carving process?
He does such a good job of describing the process and what goes through his mind. I’d love to see this with other artists, like directors, musicians, etc
Agreed. Other artists try to be coy or overly-philosophical to hide the actual mechanics of creating their works.
Sculpting in my opinion is the hardest form of art. There is literally *ZERO* room for error.
There is though, you just have to be able to let go of the original vision and change your goal. Michaelangelo carved a pieta from a stone another artist had messed up, and considered unworkable.
@@travismiller5548 That was The David
I've seen some interesting errors in sculpture
@@northfield3654 no, I mean the Florentine Pieta, "the deposition"
@@travismiller5548 the one Michelangelo didn't complete and destroyed?
Beautiful, thank you Simon Smith and Victoria and Albert Museum for sharing this with us!
I enjoyed watching thanks and love from Turkey
Carving is just about trapping the shadow! Incredible!
In the 2012 TMNT Donatello constantly corrected people saying his namesake was a painter. SCULPTOR he would shout!
I find this incredibly interesting, I know nothing of sculpting stone much less marble but I'm simply compelled to start learning. I live on an island so the only plentiful stones or rock are either river stones or lava rock. I'll also have to learn all about the tools of the trade, chisels brushes hammers etc. Anyways I'll be investigating many more videos on this subject, Thank you so much for posting this beauty.......🎸🎸🎸♥️
What a joy to watch! Thank you ❤
Beyond fascinating!
this is so fascinating!! please give us more videos like this!!
What a privilege and a blessing to be such a gifted artist, and to know that hundreds of years from now your work will still be admired and appreciated.
great interview
Great work, Simon. Wonderful work, V & A.
Marvellous talent.
"Trapping shadows" what a beautiful concept.
So educational and beautiful work. Thank you.
This is so amazing! Thank you!
Fascinating! I've always wondered how such lifelike sculptures were made. Amazing!
I learn something new each time I watch this. Simon you make me want to try this as Donatello is my favorite Early Renaissance sculptor.
Talent and magic.
Really incredible to see this process and what a fabulous teacher.
what an interview/documentary. skilled carver and communicates very well
I really enjoyed this video. You are a fantastic artist.
Nice share and best like
Very nice work
my goodness... so amazing...
1st time watching stone carving . why am i feeling so serene and relax .
Beautiful work
That was amazing, the way you described it it really meant something to me.
Beautiful sculpture
Tungsten is a metal. Tungsten carbide is a ceramic with metal in it.
thanks - i was wondering. i wonder who the heck thought of that for sculpting? 🌹
Nothing quite like a pair of skilled human hands.
Beautifully done
Wow.. thats just incredible
Stunning!
marble is such a beautiful material
Thanks for posting such awesome content! What an amazing artist he is and I loved the way he explained his process.
Utmost respect for people doing this work, keeping skills alive.
love this … such beautiful craftsmanship
Wonderful
I had a lot of joy watching this.
beautiful art form
This is quite a good introduction to the tools, process, and work habits for marble carving. The studio looks so authentic, and so does this artist. I have done copies too, but mine are drawings or paintings. And I agree with one point made here, which is that, aside from working to replicate the forms and style of the original, really the most important thing in the end it to somehow capture the "spirit". Successfully doing that can be difficult and elusive, and I must say that only an infinitesimally small percentage of later artists can ever achieve this. There is always a deep or moving spirit conveyed by the best artists in history, and I believe anyone copying such an artwork needs to become so immersed in recognizing that spirit that they can tap into the sensibility and purpose that the original artist must have felt.
I love artists sooo much!
Beautiful.
That's amazing
Unrelated, but I love your workshirt!
Incredible
W O W!!!! Excellent work.
Amazing
I am absolutely in love with sculpture. I always visit the sculpture galleries of museums and spend hours just looking at various pieces and marveling at how artists can bring out a form out of stone. Just sublime.
Do you prefer colored, the sort of sculptures the ancient Greeks and Romans made, or bare stone?
@@ZephaniahL I love the bare marble and fully admit that it’s the result of our “modern” sensibilities.
Incredible. Very rare talent to see. Thank you.
beautiful. 👌🏽
Master at work.
Fantastic!
Very impressive.
What a gift to the world this man and his talent is. If only more people could eke out the gems of their life; whether through painting, music, writing, dance etc. Bravo Simon Smith !
Well done V&A! That’s a beautiful film. I wish every piece of art could be given this captivating treatment. 10/10
"Removing the marks from the previous tool" until it reveals the beauty an artisans skills can create. Best description of carving I have ever heard (the essence of the process explained so well). "Roughing out" takes on a much more nuanced meaning with a Master's insight. Wonderful vlog Please share more.
I've never seen marble carved before. It's rather a delicate process and really quite beautiful. with one tool erasing the marks of the tool before it.
I absolutely love this! I always get put off by the less than ideal level of regard in the art world regarding copies. With music a reinterpretation of an original work is celebrated and thought of this something interesting and worthwhile, whereby in art we seem to have such much obsession with the original and copies are not often celebrated. I think this video shows that it's actually a wonderful thing to reinterpret an original work in any medium.
seems like a genuinely nice human being,........stone carving is def' a medium I haven't tried yet,......but looks so awesome.
This is absolutely fascinating! Thank you for sharing your process. I’d love to see more!
I never really though about it before, but carving (especially panel carving) can be though of as a drawing using actual shadows as the medium. That is such an interesting concept that I would have never thought of before.
Ah I love this video. Very revealing to actually see someone going at the stone like this. Have always wondered about how it is with marble. "how could they make these out of stone?? stone is so hard?" a pointy metal thing and a hammer and going bit by bit by bit. fantastic
Wow, such wonderful talent!
What a demanding art form, absolutely incredible carving into such hard material with that precision. Truly talented.
Marble is soft and fine, try granite!! granite is extremely hard and unlike the fine grain of marble- granite is very crystaline and course, it's a very difficult stone to carve!
made me want to try these tools and materials :) when I see someone doing art, I can’t help myself, but want to play with the toys these people are playing…
Beautiful allegory on how to be compelling: small nibbles
What an amazing video showing the talent required to create this piece of art. Thanks for sharing and Simon Smith...you are incredible!
thank you so much for sharing this.
that was a great video, thank you for doing it.
Simply amazing beautiful work. Wonderful craftsmanship
Beautiful. Just wonderful stuff.
What a joy!
He does a fantastic job of explaining the process in a way that makes you understand the basics without overwhelming the mind. Makes me want to try my hand at it.
It is truly sad to think the loss of appreciation for such divine art these days😢
That sublte sound made by the chisel, so carefully and proficiently driven onto the marble surface, is sheer and delightful music, to my ears.
Wow! Simon is an amazing Artist. I love watching him.
This was the fastest Seven minutes and Thirteen seconds
of my life.
Thank you for this great video,
Jeff
Only just discovered this... out of all the arts the skills of a sculptor absolutely astound me! Not gonna lie! I think this is the best "taster" video to get me to find out more about this guy... thoroughly enjoyed how he explained the process, stunning work!
What an amazing talent to have!
Sweet.
Absolutely riveting, great stuff.
Awesome! Well done
Before I ever knew how to draw, I started to carve. I was fascinated by old building brick and how soft it was and easy to work with.
Wish the video was longer very informative!
Amazing. Thank you for sharing. Would love to see more of Simon
In a world dominated by digital media and increasingly by AI -- I love seeing somebody creating something by hand, and doing it well. Nothing in the world beats hand-made artistry.
he is human hero this is revelations beautiful sacrifice his life for stone marble cutting i couldn't do this work unbelievable
It's refreshing to hear a true artist explain things in simple coherent terms versus the so called conceptual artists that spew out a bunch of nonsense trying to explain away an uninspiring useless object.
Wonderful video!
A pity it wasn't longer though - maybe 20 minutes or so!
Very relaxing and calming watching him work. A real craftsman!
I would love a long video of him just carving. No dialogue, just pure chiselling sound.
Stunning skill and talent.
This was amazing!
I have always wondered about the sculpting process. Thank you and the sculptor for sharing.
Just lookup traditional marble sculpting and they will show you exactly how Michaelangelo did it. It’s very simple all he used was a hammer a chisel and a pencil. It’s his technique and artistic ability that makes his sculptures so good.
In my youngth I was a Donatello fan