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Most Egyptian craftsmen were very skilled at what they did.  They made a successful business by using the simplest tools, though the tools weren’t always easy to handle.  Still, they managed to overlook this and made great works of art.  They were awesome at making carvings, statues, and jewelry out of precious stones that they dug or bought.

Many Egyptian craftsmen liked to make things that people were used to.  Things like the mask of Tut showed respect to Pharaohs.  Carvings of gods showed respect to the gods and the people who worshiped them.  Change in artwork was what some people feared, though it slowly happened.  Famous people were being made in different and new styles.

There were a lot of artists in the cities of Memphis and Thebes that all did well in different things.  There is a Theben temple that has a lot of art inside.  It has leatherworkers, sandal makers, metalworkers, stonecutters, chariot makers, and sculptors painted on the walls inside.  There were also jewelers, scribes, and boat makers.  Craftsmen usually worked for the wealthier people, but sometimes the villagers would trade crops for artwork.  The villagers probably did this so at the annual festivals their houses would look nicer.

Craftsmen were also hired to paint the life deeds of a recently dead Pharaoh on temple walls.  They also decorated a king’s coffin so the ba and ka could recognize the body that would become the ka’s eternal home.  (For more information on ba and ka, check out Ba and Ka.)  The main reasons for painting life deeds of Pharaohs on the walls of temples and decorating the king’s coffin were because everything the Egyptians did revolved in some way around art. The art in tombs and temples also helped researchers find out a lot about Egypt.

Metal statues were some of the finest works of art that Egyptians made.  They would normally make one by carving a mold of each side of the statue on two blocks of clay.  Then they would bind the two blocks of clay by using more clay, but they were careful about leaving a hole to pour the metal in.  Then they would heat the metal into a liquid form.  Finally, they poured the liquid metal into the mold of clay, let it sit, and took the finished statue out of the mold by chiseling the clay off.  Then they polished it until it shone to the color of the metal that was used.  When making metal statues, they would also be able to put color onto the metal statues.

By using different types of metal, Egyptian artist could make metal statues in many different colors.

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