Carving is the act of using tools to shape something from a material by scraping away portions of that material. The technique can be applied to any material that is solid enough to hold a form even when pieces have been removed from it, and yet soft enough for portions to be scraped away with available tools. Carving, as a means for making sculpture, is distinct from methods using soft and malleable materials like clay or melted glass, which may be shaped into the desired forms while soft and then harden into that form. Carving tends to require much more work than methods using malleable materials.
Kinds of carving include:
- Bone carving
- Chip carving
- Gourd carving or Gourd art
- Ice carving or Ice sculpture
- Ivory carving
- Stone carving
- Petroglyph
- Vegetable carving
- Wood carving
- Hobo nickel
Famous quotes containing the word carved:
“I ask whether the mere eating of human flesh so very far exceeds in barbarity that custom which only a few years since was practised in enlightened England:Ma convicted traitor, perhaps a man found guilty of honesty, patriotism, and suchlike heinous crimes, had his head lopped off with a huge axe, his bowels dragged out and thrown into a fire; while his body, carved into four quarters, was with his head exposed upon pikes, and permitted to rot and fester among the public haunts of men!”
—Herman Melville (1819–1891)
“A written word is the choicest of relics. It is something at once more intimate with us and more universal than any other work of art. It is the work of art nearest to life itself. It may be translated into every language, and not only be read but actually breathed from all human lips;Mnot be represented on canvas or in marble only, but be carved out of the breath of life itself. The symbol of an ancient man’s thought becomes a modern man’s speech.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“We carved not a line, and we raised not a stone,
But we left him alone with his glory.”
—Charles Wolfe (1791–1823)