NICOLE GALINATO

It's nearing Thanksgiving in the USA and that means lots of food and lots of people. I thought it might be nice to provide a festive centerpiece for the occasion while getting some carving practice in. I've managed at this point to try and solidify what to carve before knife hits pumpkin, and had a dilemma in choosing how to use the negative and positive space in a balanced way. I did a second draft in body paint because the plain black and white was throwing me off, and this helped immensely when trying to determine my negative space, where to actually cut and how to cast light and shadows on the surface. I was very pleased with how well the surface photographed due to well thought out cuts to capture light instead of unintentionally encourage shadow and a different focal point. Thankfully I didn't have to use the entire design to fit the pumpkin, and no longer use a marked on guide to keep things spaced evenly. This lasted through two big Thanksgiving fam

Branch Out: Pumpkin Carving Another halloween time project. This time I tried a twist on traditional pumpkin carving by incorporating design elements of Thai carving such as flowers and repetitive shapes and patterns. Again I found it very interesting to have to think of the design in regards to subtractive technique rather than additive. The medium as an organic canvas was also an enjoyable challenge to handle. The use of repetitive design allowed me to practice recreating certain shapes to increase speed as well as refine technique. Something funny I found was that in the way I was shown, the techniques on holding the kinfe was very particular, but my hands were just too small to hold the knife safely! So I learned to adapt differently and can now carve efficiently, without having a sharp thing slip through my fingers. That's a nice mental image.  Happy Halloween!

Note to self, get better at recording progress. By this point I ran into another challenge with having to carve into the flesh deeper to get the pink of the watermelon to show, and also angle my cuts to show on the white part. Stopped a bit short after nearly slicing off finished areas...

Branch Out: Fruit Carving First solid attempt at fruit carving with Thai carving knives using basic techniques. An interesting exercise in subtractive 2.5D sculpture, one I hope to revisit frequently.

Branch Out: Sugar A small exercise in food composition and playing with an edible medium.