Emperor Augustus

I made him from clay. First of all I made coils to make the neck and shoulders and basic shape. I cut out a piece for the chin and anchored it in with coils on the inside and continued to build up the shape of the skull. Then I scored out lines to help me position the features and added the nose and cut out hollows for the eyes and started to shape the lips and chin.

The ears were easily the hardest part. I kept making them either too big or too small, or they didn't look quite right - or they were too fat and didn't sit properly, or too thin and so too fragile. Got them sorted eventually though. The eyes were also very hard. I then scored the head all over very deeply and slipped it copiously and lay a rolled piece of clay over it, and cut it roughly so it looked like it was wearing a helmet. Then I carefully started cutting the shape of the fringe and round his ears, and then all the patterns in the hair. Whenever I got tired I took a kidney cutter thing and removed fine layers from the face and neck to help get the slightly sucken cheeks and make it the shape I wanted. Then I spent hours smoothing everything. Hours.

Finally I took a length of wire and cut the neck from the shoulders in a jagged 'I've just fallen off a statue' look and used a craft knife to cut a slight groove around the bottom of it. Then I fired it and glazed it in 3 layers of a cast iron glaze before firing it once more. Now I just need to make a nice stand for it!