Summaries and Customer Reviews are supplied by Amazon.com
Summary:
A master sculptor demonstrates how an artist can use thoughts and feelings combined with technique to produce evocative portraits in clay. Peter Rubino, who has achieved wide acclaim for his portrait busts of great sports figures, uses line drawings, illustrations, and running commentary to show how the sculptors hands and tools create a portrait likeness. 20 color and 250 b&w illustrations .
Customer Reviews:
Average Customer Rating:
Highly motivating for the creative person
Customer Rating:
This book walks you through the various stages of portrait sculpture. As a novice sculptor, the upclose, step-by-step, all angles photos including the proper usage of tools, was especially helpful. While the artist does simplify the process, the artform is still very challenging and intimidating. This book helps to de-mystifying the task.
Reasonably helpful, for beginners only
Customer Rating:
First of all, the author's portfolio is less than inspiring, to put it rather mildly. The text is actually fairly well written, and will be of some help to the beginner, although there are certainly better guides out there. To the author's credit, I've given the same rating to books with better techniques by better artists; the decent writing helps here. However there isn't much here for intermediate or advanced artists. Many of the techniques run the gamut from sloppy to downright lazy, and the results show this. If you'd like to make your way to a moderately successful stint as a mediocre contemporary sculptor without working too hard to get there, this book is for you. Of course, lots and lots of folks fit in this category. However, if you wish to push yourself to higher levels to become a disciplined, highly skilled artist, I would seriously recommend Edouard Lanteri's books instead.
Wonderful how-to reference
Customer Rating:
I am an art student, and I bought Rubino's book before enrolling in a 3-D figure study class this semester. I have just worked through the instructions for modelling the basic portrait (i.e., not from life, which is the second part of the book). Following Rubino's instructions as exactly as I could, I was able to construct a pretty good likeness on the first try. This book is an extremely useful beginner's guide to portraiture, as long as you accept the fundamental idea that you have to measure carefully. And you really do have to, even though it seems boring and uncreative at first. Note that there is little reference to surface anatomy, just planes, at least in the first section. The basic model is the young white male with a completely neutral expression, which probably shouldn't surprise anyone. Another caution: inspect the illustrations as well as the written instructions, because important nuances show up there. But if you want to get started on the right track, and nail down the basics, I can't imagine a better book. For further study, I would look at Eliot Goldfinger's works on anatomy for artists, which are detailed and comprehensive.
THE PORTRAIT IN CLAY
Customer Rating:
Excellent tutorial on portrait work in clay modeling. This book takes the student, step by step through the process. Best book I've seen on the subject.
Truly Amazing......
Customer Rating:
I have recently beagan to study sculpting more seriously and received this book as a gift. I improved tremendously with the help of this book. I'm not sure how best to communicate the message; but i must convey to you the importance of this book to anyone interested in sculpting. Does anyone know if a second series is planned?
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