The Employments of Women: A Cyclopædia of Woman's WorkPenny, Virginia
General
The Employments of Women: A Cyclopædia of Woman's Work
Penny, Virginia
Women -- Employment
=60. Modellers.= An ornamental designer and modeller writes me: "In
England I attended my lady pupils at their own residences, except one to
whom I gave instruction at my residence. One was the daughter of the
Lord Mayor of the city, another the daughter-in-law of the Earl of H.
Very few ladies learn any of the higher branches of art, except those
that do so for recreation. A person that has some skill in drawing
would, without the slightest doubt, soon acquire a knowledge of this
beautiful art. Some persons have a natural gift for modelling, while
others would not learn it with all the cultivation arising from
education and good society. Probably the best source of employment in
New York would be to design and model for the silversmiths--such as Ball
& Black, Tiffany, &c. One of the most fertile departments in Europe to
lady modellers is not carried on to any extent in this country--the
making of fine pottery. The fingers, of course, must be soiled in
modelling; but such an inconvenience is trifling compared with the
pleasure of forming fruit, flowers, and foliage, or modelling the
medallions of friends." The modelling of gas fixtures might afford
employment to a small number of qualified women. We know of one
establishment in Philadelphia where part of the designing for fixtures,
lamps, and chandeliers, is done by a lady, and all the copying done for
illustrated catalogues of those which are finished. She receives $6 a
week, and goes about 9 o'clock A. M. and remains until 4 P. M. Mr P., at
his school of art in New York, has a very large collection of casts. He
gives instruction to boys and young men in modelling and drawing,
charging 25 cents a lesson of 3 hours in the day or 2 in the evening.
They are instructed in classes. Some of his casts are gigantic. In one
of his rooms is a beautiful, but small model, in wax, for $300,
representing a hunting scene. We have been told that some ladies in
Germany model wax patterns for the ornamental work on china. Few tools
are used by a modeller--the only ones are for the sharp and delicate
parts that cannot be formed by the fingers. As clay does not shrink
uniformly in drying it is moulded before drying in plaster of Paris, and
a cast of the same material taken from that, which serves as a model for
the workman. Some artists model in wax. Women might be employed in
modelling ornamental and scroll work for brass founderies, &c., and get
good wages.
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