SPONGE SCULPTURES

Sculptures are great fun to make, especially if you use strange materials like sponge...

You will need:

• Large sponge
• Scissors
• Acrylic paint
• Card
• Black paint

Take a large old sponge, like this one, and draw around it onto some thin card.

Then design the sculpture's face in this shape. Start right at the bottom edge. Keep it simple, and draw it from sideways on.

Just fit the face to the shape of the sponge.

When you're happy, cut it out.

Use this as a template for drawing the face onto the sponge. Hold it steady and go all around the shape, following the outline.

When you've done that, turn the sponge over, and again, use the template to draw on the face. Make sure you turn the template over as well, so that the face is looking in the same direction!

Make sure that the face has a nice wide shoulder like this one - it'll help it to stand up when it's cut out.

Take some scissors and start to snip away at the sponge following the pen lines. Be careful with this, and if you need help, ask an adult to do it for you.

Slowly, your sculpture will start to take shape. If you snip too far, remember you can always glue the cut sponge back on again with neat PVA glue!

When you've finished trimming you'll have something that looks like this. Don't worry about the uneven surface on the sponge, because it all adds to the stone effect.

Before you throw the cut pieces of sponge away, how about using them for a bit of finer detail? Cut out two thin crescent moon shapes from the scrap sponge pieces, and glue them to either side of the head for ears with PVA glue.

Now to make the sponge look like stone. Paint it a stone grey colour. Acrylic paint works best for this, because it sticks well and doesn't sink into the sponge.

Cover the whole of the sculpture, back and front.

You can then add in some dark grey or black to the shaded parts, to give it some depth.

You could also paint some green around the base to give the impression of grass.

And when you've finished painting it, and it's dry, you'll have a maginificent stone Sponge Sculpture!

You can do other sculptures too. How about painting a light brown colour to get this ancient Egyptian sandy effect?

You don't have to do figures either. How about this Stonehenge sculpture? Try it yourself!