the.com/chiseling
Subtracting everything that isn't the statue until only the statue remains.
means Carving or shaping a hard material like stone or wood by cutting bits away with a chisel — or, figuratively, cheating or swindling someone in small, sly increments.
from From 'chisel,' which came into English in the Middle Ages from Old French 'cisel' (a cutting tool), tracing back to Latin 'caedere,' to cut. The literal carving sense is old and honest; the slang meaning of 'to cheat or defraud' is a much later twist, an Americanism that surfaced in the 19th century — as if a swindler were quietly shaving slivers off what's yours, the way a sculptor pares away stone.
- michelangelo's method
- He claimed he freed figures already trapped in marble
- no undo
- One wrong strike and the whole block is ruined
- ancient tech
- Copper and bronze chisels predate iron by millennia
- slang shift
- Came to mean swindling, as in chiseling someone
- strike rhythm
- Sculptors feel grain like woodcarvers reading the wood
michelangelo david statue — marble sculpture chiseled 1504 in florence, 517cm tall
mount rushmore presidents — four faces chiseled into granite cliff in south dakota, 1927-1941
easter island moai heads — 887 stone statues chiseled by rapa nui people between 1100-1680