The Venus de Milo, Michelangelo’s David, Rodin’s The Thinker and La Montagne 1937 by Maillol. These are just some of the famous sculptures the team have been asked to recreate in ice, each of them presenting different challenges.

Recreating famous sculptures in ice

Generally, an artist conceptualises a sculpture with a particular medium in mind. That specific material is as much an element of the sculpture as the shape, size and design. Therefore, it seems obvious that a sculpture will be more favourably suited to its original material than that of a replica.

Working with ice is a challenge in itself. Recreating famous sculptures in ice is a whole other ball game. Ice sculpture, like wood and stone sculpture, is subtractive, which means that the carver removes material from a larger piece.

This is considered much more technically difficult than additive and cast sculptures. However, ice presents further challenges.

Getting lots of fine detail into an ice sculpture is much harder to achieve when compared to other materials. The carver is also rather more restricted by time, particularly if she’s out in the open air, as the sculpture will start to melt!

In addition to this, the pressure to recreate a famous artwork can be far more stressful because everyone knows what it’s supposed to look like. Unfortunately they probably have little idea just how difficult it is.

Check out other famous sculptures that we’ve recreated in our Human Figures album.