Escar UK Bronze : The Art of Bronze

How Bronze Statues are produced using the 6,500 year old, Lost Wax Casting Method

TRADITIONAL

Wax has now superseded clay to create the Master, with latex, polyurethane rubber and silicone, replacing plaster for the mould. These materials have the ability to capture extremely fine details, with silicone being able to record a the whorls of a fingerprint

MODERN

Historically an original sculpture was created in wet clay, which when dry became the Master. All subsequent moulds were taken from the Master, using gypsum plaster. From this, negative moulds were produced. In its day it was obviously State of the Art but it certainly had limitations in its ability to capture and record the fine detail we enjoy today

THE ART WORK

The first stage of creating any bronze casting is to engage an artist to create a sculpture in wax. When the client is happy with the sculpture, a mould is taken from the wax

THE MOULD

Thanks to advances in technology, the modern way to produce firing waxes from the original sculpture is to create a mould from the original wax sculpture by layering liquid latex onto the wax, coat by coat, until the desired thickness is achieved

Once the latex has cured on the original wax, it is then coated with fibreglass, again building it up, layer upon layer, until it is strong enough to support the latex mould within

During this process, flanges with register marks built-in are added around the mould to facilitate splitting it into two halves when cured. This ensures that when the two halves are re-assembled, they match up perfectly. The mould is then carefully cut into two halves across the flanges and removed from the artist’s wax

DEGRADATION

Overtime after repeated use, the definition will be reduced and a new mould will need to be fashioned. This is something we keep a close eye on to ensure that our current moulds produce a finely detailed firing wax to the quality of the original. If degradation occurs, the current wax is returned to the artist, the lost details reinstated, new moulds are created and the old moulds are scrapped

THE MODERN METHOD

Thanks to advances in technology, the modern way to produce a firing wax from the original is to produce a latex mould from the original wax sculpture, which is used to create new firing waxes. Latex has the ability to copy details as fine as fingerprint and transfer that onto the firing wax