Saturday 18 January 2014

How to build a snow sculpture


Yes, you guessed it...that wooden box on the school's front yard contains snow for a snow sculpture.  It measures 4'L X 4'W X 6'H, so it is much smaller than the average snow sculptures in Voyageur Park, which measure at least 8' X 8' X 8'.

We'll give the snow another week to settle and pack down.  When we remove the aspenite sheets, we should have a strong rectangular prism of snow, ready for the students and I to carve.  Stay tuned to see what it will become!

I am blessed to have a very artistic cousin, Ralph Tanchak, who is experienced in snow sculpting and who has in the past competed in the snow-sculpting competition at Festival du Voyageur.  He is a professional artist who does amazing commissioned works of art, art workshops and has a website at www.colour-splash.ca  . He kindly shared with me some tips and tricks of the trade:


How to build a box to house the snow

  Fill your box with fresh snow and allow to settle 1-2 weeks.  Any size of box will do.


Make a design on paper first, showing the overhead, front and side views of your design.  Then using grid lines, transfer your design onto your block of snow.  Scale: 1" square on paper = 1' square on your snow block.


Artist Ralph Tanchak at work.  He recommends using anything that carves--spatulas, square garden spades, even hand saws.    




A Voyageur on a Harley?!?!

I hope to share more of Ralph's snow sculpture photos in another post.  Stay tuned.

A bientôt!

Mme Christensen




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