This weekend Chris and I went to see the Terracotta Warriors at the National Geographic museum in DC. I had promised to up lots of photos to gush about unfortunately no photography was allowed in the exhibit. That made me very sad but it was an amazing site to see. As a ceramic artist I always marvel at the ceramics of old. It amazes how they have stood the test of time and left such a mark on the world. These warriors and their horses were pretty amazing from any ceramics standpoint. The warriors weighed between 350-400 pounds each and the horses 750 pounds. Wow.
For most of the first half of the exhibit I kept saying ok but how did they make them? My question was finally answered in the second half. I was disappointed they didn't give more room to explaining the process but I suppose if you aren't an artist you may not find it so fascinating. They were built in teams and pieced together by section. The legs solid and the bodies and arms were coiled and then covered in slabs to be carved for detail work. So they didn't explode the heads were built separately and placed on after they were finished. The really interesting thing is they never found a kiln any where nearby so they aren't sure how these were fired. In one piece? Was the kiln built around and then taken down? I guess that's one thing we may never know.
It really was awesome to see these warriors and it really inspired me to try to go and work on great things. They are there until March and if you can get over there I recommend you do. If you can go during a week day. We went on a weekend and it was packed I suspect a weekday may give you more standing room which is always nice when taking in art.
The rest of valentines day weekend was wonderful including, dinner, brunch, a movie, flowers, finding a pillow that looks like shippo and brownies by the fire! More snow is predicted for today so we will see how this week goes!
It seemed to me that they were fired in one piece, which I find totally amzing given their size and weight. The other thing that impressed me was the amount of detail..even the bottom of their shoes were textured!! And also the fact that they were all different. The pictures of the ranks of soldiers in the tombs looked like a crowd of different individuals. Amzing amount of work.
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