{"product_id":"swan-on-carved-water-white-marble-statue-150cm","title":"Swan on Carved Water White Marble Statue - 150cm","description":"\u003ch3\u003eDescription\u003c\/h3\u003e\u003cp\u003eA swan rises from carved water, both wings lifted and its bill closed on a carved scroll. Both wings are cut in long tiered rows of feathers and the breast is left smooth. The device held in the beak is a scrolled volute, carved in the same idiom as the water. Beneath it the water is carved in scrolled volutes, formal rather than naturalistic. The whole stands on a plain stepped plinth. Bright white marble, the faintest grey drift only in the scrolls and the plinth.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003ch2\u003eCarving the Air Behind a Device Held in a Beak\u003c\/h2\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe scroll in the bill is a small thing that costs a great deal. It hangs below the head and runs back to touch the neck, which means the finished piece has an enclosed void behind it - a loop of open air ringed by beak, scroll, throat and neck, all of them thin. There is no way to reach into that space with anything but the smallest tools, and no way to correct a slip once the surrounding stone is gone. It is cut in the reverse of the obvious order: the void is opened while the beak, the scroll and the neck are all still oversized and can take a knock, and each of the four is thinned to its final section afterwards, working from inside the loop outward. The neck itself is left thick until the very end, since it is the only thing carrying the head and everything on it.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWater carved as scrolls rather than as water is a decorative convention, not an illustration, and it settles where the piece belongs: beside still water rather than moving. A formal pool, a rill, a tank, the edge of a canal - anywhere the real surface is flat enough to answer the carved one. At 150cm the raised wings reach about head height on someone standing beside it. The spread wings give it a wide silhouette from the side and a narrow one from the front, so it wants to be seen broadside; and it reads strongly as one of a pair flanking steps or a gate, which is worth knowing before a single one is placed. Bright white against dark water or clipped yew is where it separates best.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003ch2\u003eA Piece for Standing Water\u003c\/h2\u003e\u003cp\u003eSixteen to eighteen weeks. Carving the water scrolls to a finish precedes the bird, which is then seated down into them. The stepped plinth is dressed and the cloud-and-wave scrolls cut and hollowed, then the bird roughed and seated down into them. The body comes first as a compact mass, the breast left smooth, the wings held as thick slabs while the feather tiers are laid out from the shoulder outward. The void behind the beak is opened while beak, scroll and neck are all still oversized, and the four are brought to section from inside outward. Bird, water and plinth are free of pins and fillers, each course bedded dry. Some 1,969kg across bird and plinth, gantry-borne and bedded onto a prepared footing. Our main studios are in the UK (Birmingham) and Dubai, with additional global workshops.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWaterbirds occupy part of \u003ca href=\"\/collections\/animal-sculptures\"\u003eanimal sculptures\u003c\/a\u003e, and park-scale work belongs to \u003ca href=\"\/collections\/outdoor-sculptures\"\u003eoutdoor 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":53836658770267,"sku":"MST-ANI-104","price":22249.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0869\/3383\/2027\/files\/MST-ANI-104_1.jpg?v=1787173468","url":"https:\/\/giant-sculptures.com\/products\/swan-on-carved-water-white-marble-statue-150cm","provider":"Giant Sculptures","version":"1.0","type":"link"}