As I begin some new sculptures for my Voynich Manuscript Series, I wanted to explain how the very beginnings of the process starts—before even starting to make the sculpture, how do I decide how to design it in the first place? Since each sculpture is very different, and uses materials in different ways, they each require a different way of planning.

When I began my Voynich series, I thought I would pick just a few images from the manuscript for inspiration… well, it turned out to be impossible to pick “just a few” the more I delved into the subject and became intrigued by so many aspects of the imagery. Currently I’m beginning a sculpture based on this illustration, folio 73r of the Voynich Manuscript:

I want to design my sculptures to reference the original, staying true to some particular details, but also with a creative twist. With this one, I want to emphasize the green critter holding the star in the center, and the four nymphs standing at the top of the page, while keeping a circular shape to the sculpture and using that as part of the supportive structure.

I liked the results of combining porcelain and glass in my last sculpture, so I want to use both mediums again for this one. I’ll use porcelain for the round structure, the critter, and the nymphs, and then I’ll make the stars out of lighted glass.

(Side note: when I refer to combining these mediums, I mean that I will make the sculpture in separate parts- the porcelain separately from the glass- and design it such that they ultimately fit together as an assembly. The distinction is that the glass and porcelain are not actually fused or melted together, which would be a complicated technical challenge since the two materials normally have very different expansion rates. They react differently to being heated and cooled, so attempting to fuse them together would result in a badly cracked sculpture. There are some techniques that potentially can achieve this, but that’s a subject for a different post and another extended project!) In the meantime, there are many ways to design a sculpture so that it seamlessly integrates porcelain with glass.

In planning the design, I decided I would make a three-dimensional, half-hemisphere shape similar to that which I made for a previous series of sculptures, my wall-hanging porcelain planets:

To get this smooth shape that is circular as viewed from the front, and three-dimensional as viewed from the side, I use a plaster mold that I made out of a cooking wok. When a sheet of wet clay is formed into the mold, the plaster absorbs the moisture, and the mold can be turned upside down and lifted away when the clay is dry enough to hold its shape.

For the new sculpture, I’ll be using this molding technique to form the round structure, but then making some alterations. This will be like a three-dimensional “canvas” to which I can add more elements of the Voynich imagery. Instead of a solid shape, I’ll cut a circle out of the center, to make an open alcove where a hand-sculpted three-dimenstional “critter” can stand inside (think of the way a hamster runs inside a wheel, and it might help to picture it…) The nymphs will stand at the top, probably with some type of extra panel of clay behind them for support. I haven’t completely figured that part out yet, but as I finish designing it will become more clear.) Similar to my planet sculptures, the circular structure will be mounted vertically (probably in some kind of stand rather than attached to a wall) so as to be viewed from the front.

I took one of my previously-made planet sculptures as a model (ignoring the surface patterns) and made a print-out of the manuscript page which I then scaled up by photocopying, until its size matched the diameter of the hemisphere:

If I were to stop here and sculpt at this scale, it would all be in extreme miniature, and I don’t want that. Also, the illustration has a grand total of 30 nymphs, all holding stars, so instead of sculpting all, I want to emphasize and enlarge only a few. Their appearance will stay true to the original manuscript but the composition will be something new.

With photocopying, I can print at different scales, cut them out, and move them around to see how it would look, to work out ideas:

(I guess I could stop here and call it done; a Voynich Manuscript creature standing on the surface of the planet Jupiter?)

After I played around with the paper cut-out arrangements, and got a better idea of the sizing, I was able to come up with more specific plans. I made another sketch with the scale adjusted to be a bit bigger than what I ultimately want, because porcelain clay shrinks by nearly 15% after it is fired, so this is something to plan for.

I also made a list of steps for the construction of the porcelain so that I can also visualize the plan and how it all will connect together.

I first thought I would sculpt the nymphs in relief, but now I think I will try to make them fully three-dimensional. I will probably make them separately from the round section, because porcelain is more forgiving when sculpted in a modular way with parts fired in the kiln separately, to be assembled later. Another thing to think about is how the scale will change the technique of hand-sculpting. I want these sculptures to be fairly small, but not any smaller than the last nymph I sculpted, because at a certain point it would become too small to easily add detail. For example, I probably wouldn’t want to go any smaller than the previous nymph, because, as you can see from this photo of her miniature hand that I made, it was very small, hardly any bigger than my thumbnail! (Also, that was polymer clay, and porcelain has its own slightly different challenges…)

I’ll probably continue to revise the plan, but as the process continues, the final sculpture will start to reveal itself, and next time I will show how I get started with the porcelain.

Stars, Nymphs, and Odd Green Critters: Where to Begin?