Wednesday, February 17, 2010

Making a chocolate sculpture

In preparation for my recent chocolate event I knew that I wanted two show pieces - one that showed off my talent, and one that showed off local artists. I put the word out for any artists working in cast sculptures and found Jay Scott. He does some really beautiful casted work including the faces that I used on my Cake of a Thousand Faces.

For this centerpiece he loaned me a silicone formed mold of a female bust with long flowing hair. I didn't have the time or chocolate to do a trial run so I just started my tempering. I poured about two pounds of dark chocolate into the mold then swished it around a few times, let it rest for 30 seconds each time, re-swish, re-rest...a process of about ten minutes.

After ten minutes I poured out the excess and let the sculpture rest overnight. The next morning I very carefully removed the plaster cast from the silicone.

And then even more carefully removed the silicone mold from the chocolate. This was incredibly nerve racking!

Knowing my chocolate was in perfect temper and believing that the mold was at a good room temp, the lack of sheen was, at first, disappointing. But, the more I looked at it the more I liked it. The dusty finish looked like terra cotta. I opted to leave it as is and am very glad I did.

After the event I crushed her up and put her into brownies :)

4 comments:

Manggy said...

HAH! I had to laugh out loud at the last sentence. Now I no longer have to wonder what becomes of old chocolate sculptures. Of course.
I wonder if the surface is the result of imperfections on the mold itself.

Tri2Cook said...

I was thinking maybe it's the result of the plaster cast holding the heat from the chocolate... but I agree with Rob, it looks good that way.

Lois B said...

I thought the finish was beautiful and intentional. :) It was was the perfect fit with the rustic (but luxurious) setting.

Gfron1 said...

The finish wasn't intentional, since I didn't do a trial run on it, but my guess is still that the mold, being so large and dense, was a bit chillier than it needed to be. Its also possible that it was residue or a non-smooth surface at a very small level.