Giving Eleanor Coade a run for her money…

Rupert Gunnis’s “Dictionary of British Sculptors 1660 -1851” contains more than seventeen hundred entries.  If any of those luminaries were to come back to life, they would find that, in terms sculptural of materials and techniques, nothing much has changed. 

However, on poking around my studio, one or two items would catch their eye.  Not least amongst these recent innovations would be my garden spray and polythene sheets.  To keep their clay figures moist they had to splash water from a bucket and cover with damp cloths.

In terms of materials, silicon rubber has simplified mould making.  Whereas previously it took dozens of segments of a plaster piece mould to replicate the form, flexible silicon can do in one. 

Polymers, as an admixture, have revolutionised the plaster cast by enabling it to survive the outdoor environment.   One hundred and fifty years ago a secretly formulated material known as “Coade Stone” made a similar innovation.  Decorative features made of this material adorn Buckingham Palace and many other London buildings.

My life-size seated figure, the initial clay version of which I featured in my diary a few days ago, has been made permanent in polymer plaster.  It has already survived one hurricane, and who knows, it may well give Eleanor Coade, the inventor of “Coade Stone” a run for her money!