Why I Teach

A Little About My Journey

Just three years ago, before I started my Diploma of Visual Art at TAFE Nambour, I had absolutely no idea how to sculpt a human head.

During the one-year course I was introduced to painting, drawing, ceramics, sculpture and art history. It was an incredible introduction to the visual arts, and I am very grateful to my teachers — Andrew Bryant, Kerry Wilson, Jade McCafferty, Carlo de Bono, Trish Fitzgerald, Maddison Hunter and Tess Miller — who brought so much experience and knowledge to the course.

Looking back, I understand that the purpose of the diploma was to introduce us to a broad range of creative disciplines within one year. We were given the opportunity to experience different materials, techniques and ways of working, and to discover which areas interested us enough to explore further.

But when so many different areas of art have to be covered within one year, there is naturally only so much time to go deeply into each one. We were introduced to many techniques and processes and given the opportunity to try them for ourselves, but often there wasn’t enough time to develop a deep understanding or become confident in executing every process.

We were also a class of close to thirty students, which meant that individual guidance naturally had to be shared among many people. Our teachers always did their best to support us individually, while also encouraging us to explore, experiment and develop our own ways of working.

This was particularly true for me with ceramics and sculpture. I was introduced to many different forms of ceramic work, including portrait sculpture, but being introduced to a process is very different from becoming confident in executing it. I began to realise that understanding an idea or seeing a demonstration was only the beginning. The deeper learning came from putting that knowledge into practice — repeatedly.

I remember being introduced to portrait sculpture during my first semester. We were given some helpful notes and an introduction to the process, and from there I began to learn through hands-on experience, observation, repetition and experimentation.

For me, this became a very important part of the learning process. I would try something, look at it, make adjustments, try again, and gradually begin to understand how the different parts of the face relate to one another.

I certainly wasn’t confident at the beginning. For one assessment we were required to make a sculpted head, and I had no idea what I was doing. Most students made one head. I ended up making three.

Looking back, that repetition was one of the best things I could have done. In the second semester, when we had to develop a body of work, I made another four heads. By then I was beginning to understand more about the process — not because I had suddenly learned everything, but because I had spent more time doing it.

I began to understand that sculpting a face isn’t simply about knowing where to put the eyes, nose and mouth. It is about understanding the whole structure of the head, how the different parts relate to one another, and how even a small adjustment can change the entire face.

One of those sculptures cracked in several places. Andrew Bryant, who taught ceramics in my second semester, was able to explain exactly why it had happened. That became another important lesson for me about working with clay: learning not only what to do, but why clay behaves the way it does.

Learning Beyond the Diploma

After finishing the diploma, I kept making sculpture and kept learning as I went. But I was still frustrated. I wanted to understand portrait sculpture more deeply, particularly how to construct and refine the face.

I looked for a practical, hands-on sculpture course on the Sunshine Coast that focused specifically on building a face or a head, but I couldn’t find one. So I turned to online learning.

I worked through a wonderful course by Cristina Córdova, which introduced me to hand-sculpting a hollow ceramic bust using a slab-building technique. Her approach showed me how a relatively simple template of the face and upper torso could be developed by manipulating and pressing the clay, gradually transforming the form into a hollow ceramic bust.

I also studied a master sculpture course by the professional figurative sculptor Amelia Rowcroft. Her approach is more traditional, progressively building the sculptural form from the beginning. Her teaching gave me another perspective on constructing the human head and helped me become much more comfortable with the process. I also became more familiar with using a grid system, which helped me understand proportions and the relationships between the features.

Both approaches were extremely valuable. But they also taught me something else: learning to sculpt takes time, practice and a lot of hands-on work.

A course can show you a process and give you knowledge and techniques, but the real learning happens when you put your own hands into the clay and try to make it work.

I invested quite a lot in my own learning, including more than $800 in one of the sculpture courses, and I continued practising almost every day. The courses gave me knowledge and different ways of approaching the human form, but the real progress came from putting those lessons into practice — making mistakes, trying again, looking carefully, adjusting and repeating.

I learned that there is no substitute for putting in the hours.

The short version

• TAFE gave me the foundation
• I had to practise and experiment
• I discovered that repetition was incredibly important
• I continued learning after TAFE
• Now I want to provide the more focused, individual, hands-on experience that I was looking for myself

Why I Want to Teach

This is where the idea for my workshops came from.

I know what it feels like to sit in front of a lump of clay and think: where do I even start?

I know the frustration of spending hours on something and still feeling that the face is not quite right. And I also know that you are often much closer than you think.

Sometimes the problem isn’t that the whole sculpture is wrong. It may be one proportion, one plane, one feature, or simply the way two forms relate to each other. The difficulty is knowing what to look for and what to change.

That is where I believe hands-on guidance can make a real difference.

In my workshops, I am right there with you while you are working. I can look at your sculpture, see where you may be getting stuck, and give you a suggestion or a small hint at the moment you need it. I can demonstrate something, let you try it yourself, and then help you adjust what you have made.

I learned many of these things the hard way — through mistakes, repetition, study, experimentation and simply putting in the hours. Because of that, I understand many of the frustrations that come with learning portrait sculpture.

I remember looking at other people’s work and thinking: you have already spent twenty hours on this — why stop now? What would another two hours of careful work do for it?

Don’t give up too soon. Keep looking. Keep adjusting. Keep learning.

I am not presenting myself as someone who has always known how to sculpt. Quite the opposite. I struggled. I made mistakes. I repeated the process. I studied. I experimented. I kept practising. And slowly, I became more confident.

Because I learned it the hard way, I have a good understanding of the frustrations that come with portrait sculpture — and of what actually helped me get past them. That is the knowledge I would like to share through my workshops: not a promise of a shortcut, but the opportunity to learn by doing, with someone beside you who can guide you, answer your questions, demonstrate techniques and help you recognise what to look for in your own work.

Because sometimes, a small hint at the right moment can help you see your sculpture differently.

And sometimes, all you need is someone to say: don’t stop yet. Look again.

The Workshops

Both workshops are small by design — exactly four participants, running only when all four places are filled — and both focus on female head and portrait sculpture.

Sculpting the Human Head in Clay Head, Moulded Form & Ornament