{"product_id":"prowling-tiger-black-marble-statue-150cm","title":"Prowling Tiger Black Marble Statue - 150cm","description":"\u003ch3\u003eDescription\u003c\/h3\u003e\u003cp\u003eA big cat prowls forward, head turned out and the jaws wide open on bared fangs. The shoulder is dropped and the near foreleg reaching, the tail curls up and over behind, and a pronounced ruff runs along the cheek. The body is long and lean with the ribs and shoulder blade showing through the hide. No stripes are carved. Near-black marble, mirror-polished, with faint grey mottling showing where the light falls. It stands on a shaped base cut as low rock. Near-black marble throughout figure and rock, polished to a hard even sheen.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003ch2\u003eRibs Brought Up Under the Hide\u003c\/h2\u003e\u003cp\u003eWhat makes this animal read as a predator rather than as a large cat is that you can see its skeleton working. The ribs, the shoulder blade riding forward as the foreleg reaches, the hollow behind the hip - all of it has to be modelled as bone pushing up from underneath rather than as grooves cut into a surface. That is a matter of order: the whole flank is brought down to the level of the deepest hollow first, so the ribs are what is LEFT rather than what is added, and the hide is then eased over them in long shallow passes. Cut the grooves into a finished flank instead and the animal looks starved rather than lean, which is the difference between a good carving and a distressing one.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eBecause the stone is near-black and mirror-polished, at any distance this reads as a silhouette: the modelling that the carving is all about only appears when you are close enough for the polish to return light from something other than the sky. At 150cm the open jaws are at about chest height on someone walking past. That argues for a position people pass within a few paces of - a path, a terrace edge, a gateway, the side of a drive - and against the middle of a large lawn, where it will be a black cat-shape and nothing more. Pale paving or gravel beneath it does more good than anything you put behind it.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003ch2\u003eA Silhouette Rather Than a Surface\u003c\/h2\u003e\u003cp\u003eSixteen to eighteen weeks. Bringing a lean cat's ribs and shoulder blade up under the hide is the whole modelling. The rock base is blocked and the animal roughed prowling upon it, all four legs left as columns. The flank is then taken down to the level of its deepest hollow so that ribs and shoulder blade remain standing, and the hide is eased over them in long shallow passes. The open jaws and fangs are cut late, the cheek ruff undercut after them, and the curling tail freed last. The whole is then taken through the polishing grades. Cat and rock take no pin, no dowel and no filler anywhere at all. Some 1,969kg for cat and rock, which one gantry lift beds onto a prepared pad. Our main studios are in the UK (Birmingham) and Dubai, with additional global workshops.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eBig cats prowl across \u003ca href=\"\/collections\/animal-sculptures\"\u003eanimal sculptures\u003c\/a\u003e, and near-black stone is rare in \u003ca href=\"\/collections\/marble-sculptures\"\u003emarble sculptures\u003c\/a\u003e.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003ch3\u003eSpecification\u003c\/h3\u003e\u003ctable class=\"spec_table\"\u003e\u003ctbody\u003e\n\u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eHeight\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003e150cm\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n\u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eBase\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eIncluded\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n\u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eMaterial\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eHand-Carved Natural Marble\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n\u003c\/tbody\u003e\u003c\/table\u003e","brand":"Giant Sculptures","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":53837358858587,"sku":"MST-ANI-152","price":22249.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0869\/3383\/2027\/files\/MST-ANI-152_1.jpg?v=1787182804","url":"https:\/\/giant-sculptures.com\/products\/prowling-tiger-black-marble-statue-150cm","provider":"Giant Sculptures","version":"1.0","type":"link"}