< CHOOSING A FOUNDRY
FOUNDRY FEES
Not many people would describe having a sculpture or other design cast at a professional art foundry as being inexpensive. In fact metal casting can be a very expensive process indeed, with only the smallest and simplest of lost wax designs costing less than $1000.00 or so to produce.
Despite the expense, the cost of a professionally produced cast has to be seen in some context. There is little in the way of automation to be found in art foundries – the wide variety of unique artworks typically produced in this environment makes any investment in mass production tooling inpractical. The labour used to produce cast artworks is generally very skilled and a great many hours can go into producing even a small sculpture. Capital equipment (furnaces, air compressors, welders, hand tooling), is expensive to purchase and much of this machinery requires ongoing maintainance. Most foundries need lot of space – so renting industrial units can also represent a significant overhead, especially in large cities.
Materials costs also have to be considered, though compared to the labour expenses and facility overheads mentioned above, materials can make up a much smaller proportion of each cast’s unit cost than most might realise. The cost of metal casting alloys varies according to fluctuating rates determined on the international metal exchanges, though the ‘scrap’ value of metal used in the average sculpture is unlikely to exceed either the labour costs, or foundry overhead required to produce the work. In some cases either the rubber in the reproduction mould, or investment materials in the refractory mould, can exceed the value of metal used in the cast.
This does not mean the art founder is making a massive profit at the artist’s expense, simply that the distribution of cost is often quite different to that assumed by the layman. Costs, from whatever source are inevitably passed on to the artist - or whoever else is paying for the work to be cast. The central issue is that a well executed art and design cast is also often a piece of bespoke craftsmanship in metal, designed to last hundreds of years - a cast sculpture is not a piece of mass produced consumer wear that is obsolete in a few short years at best. Once again, you are likely to get what you are prepared to pay for.
FOUNDRY QUOTATIONS & ESTIMATES >
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