The New Student's Reference Work/Cast

Cast, a term applied when a work of sculptured art—a figure or a group of figures—is reproduced in plaster or, less perishably, in bronze. Famous works of antiquity are often thus reproduced when replicas (duplicates or repetitions) are made of them as models for study in schools of art or for exhibition in museums or art galleries. The process of reproduction is first to lubricate the original carefully that it may not be injured or defaced, and so that the applied plaster shall not adhere to it when it is coated with the plaster, after which, when the latter is dry, the mold or shell is removed, either whole or in parts. This cast, as it is called, when it is put together, furnishes, generally speaking, a faithful reproduction of the original, and from it repeated copies may be similarly made. When the original is designed to be reproduced in bronze or other metal, the process is termed founding, the reproduction being done from suitable molds in a foundry.