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For the next five weeks, I’m going to post a series of blog post on 3D printing in Fine Arts. So keep tuned!

Funnily enough, 3D printing very first historical mention is in fiction and was thus imaging by artists!

How the comics artist #Hergé came up with the idea for #3Dprinting ! #Tintin #comics #3Dprinter pic.twitter.com/o6hOgtsk20
— Emilie Walsh (@emilouwalsh)
3 August 2017

It makes no doubt that 3D printing is a technique that has appealed to creative at a very early stage of its development. An early example of an artist creation using 3D printing technology would be Patrick Jouin, Solid Chair.

It has now been acquired by some major contemporary museum across the world, including the Stedelijk museum in the Netherland and the Centre Pompidou in France.

Following the artist first experimentation, large national museum stated to dedicate exhibition to 3D printing in fine arts. Recently the Centre Pompidou in Paris had an exhibition solely on 3D printing in Fine Arts, Print the world. I tell you more about this show in a couple of weeks!

But what are the impact of this newly developed technology in the Art world?

Last year, I was asked by Master students Yuan, Mengxuan and their team about how are contemporary artists using 3D printing. One very interesting question I was asked was how is 3D printing shifting the Fine Arts practices and especially sculpture. Some very innovative practices with 3D printing involve using it to create forms that couldn’t be created otherwise.

Joshua Harker is an artist how has pushed the technology to a high level of achievement. Have a look at his beautifully intricate sculptures:

Because you can design your model theoretically in a 3D modelling software, it doesn’t need to be made in a way that the human hand could. For example, you can have designed some intricate forms, inside one another, is way no traditional tool could carve, mould or cast. example mask Bjork:

whole without parts : https://t.co/U9ks14c2ir
— björk (@bjork)
30 June 2016

Fashion is also an industry that is looking closely at 3D printing

Another extraordinary piece at @metmuseum’s MANUS X MACHINA. #3DPrinting used to push the boundaries of fashion. pic.twitter.com/wri3FIdip8
— Dejan (@heyDejan)
24 June 2016

Another aspect of 3D printing, that might be interesting some of you, is the capacity of testing out 3D ideas very quickly. This has early appeal to artists, and 3D printing is often uses as a prototyping phase. Some artist use 3D modelling and printing to create a model, and then make a mould and cast it in a more traditional material like bronze. 3D printing is not creating a competition between techniques and media. Artists will keep working with ceramic, marble or bronze. But 3D printing might open up the possibilities. It is just another fantastic opportunity for creative to imagine new forms and communicated their ideas quickly and test them out in a tangible material.

How is the democratisation of fabrication techniques created by 3D printing a challenge for artists and designers?

When photography was invented, some voices were heard saying that it was the death of painting. Almost 200 years after, both media are strong and vibrant in the Fine Arts world.

Walter Benjamin was questioning the impact of photography with it essay “Art at the time of reproducibility”. We could reactivate this question today and ask about sculpture at the time of reproducibility. Interestingly, the reproducibility of 3D printing models is not seen as a threat by artists, but rather use in their practices as a way of questioning our traditional means of production, or ownership issues. Duane Linklater from Canada uses 3D printing in his sculpture, reproducing Native American artefacts:

“ I was interested in unauthored art objects, more specifically, those objects that don’t have an attributed artist to their name. I thought that this is an interesting problem to work with. For me, it’s reflected what happens with Native American objects when they enter into predominately European modern and contemporary museums — that they often lose information when they’ve been acquired. I was looking for a particular way of making these objects, copying these objects as part of creating an analogous object to speak to that loss. As a result, the final sculptures that were presented, of course, are representative of all of this lost information, missed translations. For me, that was a really important project to do”

So there are many ways in which 3D printing could be inspiring for you. If you are interested in learning more for your art practice or your research, be in touch to take part in one of our free workshops. You can learn how to use some easy CAD software such as TinkerCAD. The 3D modelling software Fusion 360 also has a function that allows to free form a model by playing with it like a ball of clay. Yuliang, studying Engineering at Melbourne Uni, uses it for his CAD models: