Face facts: Statues of stars like Kane and Ronaldo don't always deliver. Sculptors offer advice

LONDON (AP) — One art critic compared the new Harry Kane bronze statue to a bulging-jawed comic strip character.

In Miami, observers say the Dwyane Wade sculpture looks more like actor Laurence Fishburne than the former basketball star. Of course, the infamous Cristiano Ronaldo bust in 2017 gave the chiseled soccer star a chubby face and goofy smile.

A statue of Mohamed Salah in 2018 depicted the Liverpool star with a disproportionately large head. In 2011, a terracotta warrior statue of Andy Murray at a Shanghai tennis tournament drew chuckles, including from the star himself: “I thought I was better looking than that."

It wasn't always this way. In classical times, sculptors “had absolutely no interest in depicting people accurately,” explained Lucy Branch, a London-based sculptural conservator.

“What they ended up doing quite often, they recycled sculptures so when another athlete became more prominent, they just changed the name on the plaque,” said Branch, host of the “Sculpture Vulture” podcast.

“There’s this idea now, in this era, that commemorative sculpture should be like portraiture — it should look exactly like the person they are commemorating. But actually that's a really new idea in sculpture."

To avoid pitfalls, here are some tips from sculptors:

London-based sculptor Hywel Pratley studied countless images of Queen Elizabeth II to create a memorial statue in the East Midlands town of Oakham.

“A good portrait sculpture is evidence of 1,000 decisions after 10,000 observations,” Pratley said.

In addition, Yorkshire county sculptor Steve Winterburn recommends getting close with a subject's family and friends to help find characteristics.

“You don’t want it looking like a Madame Tussauds,” said Winterburn, who created a statue of five Rugby League greats at Wembley Stadium. “It still needs a bit of art in it, a bit of soul. That’s what makes art really sing.”

The Ronaldo bust depicted the Portugal star smiling crookedly. Likewise, the Salah sculpture features the Egyptian smiling while celebrating a goal. In Miami, Wade's mouth is open in the statue representing the moment the player famously jumped onto a courtside table and yelled “This is my house.”

It's probably best avoided.

“It’s really difficult to do teeth looking good in sculpture,” Pratley said.

Start "by understanding the profile" before moving on to determine widths from the front view, Pratley said.

“Get the profile right and you will have won half the battle, because then you can have something at least that you can trust,” he said. “When you’re lost, you can say, ‘well I knew where I was then,’ — and you will get lost as a sculptor in the forms.

"There’s so many to understand. It’s not two dimensions, it’s three. There’s an exponential opportunity for everything to go wrong. If you’ve got the profile, then you can go forward with more confidence.”

Winterburn tries to make the eyes “come alive” in his work.

"The eye is the soul of the person that carries it," he said. “If you look at a lot of public work, I’m not being funny, they’re dead. There’s nothing in them, they’re just featureless, soulless. With a painting, if in doubt, fade it out. With sculpture, there is nowhere to hide."

For Pratley, especially when he is working with a live model, “I’m often struck by how the absolute essence of somebody is somewhere between the nostrils and the mouth. The flicker of muscles and the subtle movement of muscles around the mouth is so much you — it’s so much that person.”

Commemorative sculpture historically has been on plinths, Branch notes.

“Part of the reason for that is because we put our heroes on a pedestal," she said. "The problem is, the lower to the ground the sculpture is, the more scrutiny it’s going to get and the less it can get away with not looking quite right.”

The Kane sculpture features the England captain seated.

“Being so low, people get to look at it incredibly closely,” Branch said. “It’s trying to get sculpture to be more with the people, but then that comes with its own problems.”

In the UK, local councils — like a city council in the US — might propose a project, fund it and select the sculptor, sometimes with little input from the public and limited vetting of artists.

Branch says there's a better way: Vote on it.

That's what happened for the Emmeline Pankhurst statue in Manchester. A selection committee used an online platform to get public input and Hazel Reeves' proposal to honor the suffragette won.

“It is a really good balance and check for whether people on the committees have chosen the right sculptor or the right composition for that person who is being commemorated,” Branch said. “(The public) may not necessarily be highly educated about sculpture, but they always tend to know whether the artist has hit the nail on the head.”

AP soccer: https://apnews.com/hub/soccer

FILE - A statue of Brazilian soccer legend Pele stands on the side of the highway at the entrance to Tres Coracoes, the city where he was born in Brazil, Monday, Dec. 5, 2022. (AP Photo/Bruna Prado, File)

FILE - Former LA Galaxy MLS soccer midfielder David Beckham looks at a statue of himself at Legends Plaza in front of Dignity Health Sports Park in Carson, Calif., Saturday, March 2, 2019. (AP Photo/Ringo H.W. Chiu, File)

FILE - A child touches a statue of Portuguese star soccer player Cristiano Ronaldo in Funchal, the capital of Madeira island, Portugal, Monday, March 27 2017. (AP Photo/Armando Franca, File)

FILE - Andy Murray of Britain poses next to a terracotta warrior sculpture of him after he unveiled it at the Shanghai Masters tennis tournament in Shanghai, China, Tuesday, Oct. 11, 2011. (AP Photo/Andy Wong, File)

FILE - A bronze statue of Liverpool striker Mohammed Salah is on display in a conference hall at an international youths gathering, in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt, Monday, Nov. 5, 2018. (AP Photo/Ayman Aref, File)

FILE - Former Miami Heat NBA basketball player Dwyane Wade looks at a bronze statue in his image during its unveiling ceremony outside Kaseya Center, Sunday, Oct. 27, 2024, in Miami, Fla. (AP Photo/Michael Laughlin, File)

FILE - Real Madrid's Cristiano Ronaldo stands next to a bust of himself at the Madeira international airport outside Funchal, the capital of Madeira island, Portugal, Wednesday March 29, 2017. (AP Photo/Armando Franca, File)

A statue of England and Bayern Munich striker Harry Kane during the unveiling of a statue at The Peter May Centre in London, Monday Nov. 18, 2024. (Zac Goodwin/PA via AP)

Harry Kane poses during the unveiling of a statue of himself at The Peter May Centre in London, Monday Nov. 18, 2024. (Zac Goodwin/PA via AP)

BUSAN, South Korea (AP) — The world’s nations will wrap up negotiating a treaty this weekend to address the global plastic pollution crisis.

Their meeting concludes Sunday or early Monday in Busan, South Korea, where many environmental organizations have also flocked to push for a treaty to address the volume of production and toxic chemicals used in plastic products.

Greenpeace said it escalated its pressure Saturday by sending four international activists to Daesan, South Korea, who boarded a tanker headed into port to load chemicals used to make plastics.

Graham Forbes, who leads the Greenpeace delegation in Busan, said the action is meant to remind world leaders they have a clear choice: Deliver a treaty that protects people and the planet, or side with industry and sacrifice the health of every living person and future generations.

Here’s what to know about plastics:

The use of plastics has quadrupled over the past 30 years. Plastic is ubiquitous. And every day, the equivalent of 2,000 garbage trucks full of plastic are dumped into the world’s oceans, rivers and lakes, the UN said. Most nations agreed to make the first global, legally binding plastic pollution accord, including in the oceans, by the end of 2024.

The production and use of plastics globally is set to reach 736 million tons by 2040, according to the intergovernmental Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.

Panama is leading an effort to address the exponential growth of plastic production as part of the treaty, supported by more than 100 countries. There’s just too much plastic, said Juan Carlos Monterrey, head of Panama’s delegation.

“If we don’t have production in this treaty, it is not only going to be horribly sad, but the treaty may as well be called the greenwashing recycling treaty, not the plastics treaty,” he said in an interview. “Because the problem is not going to be fixed.”

China was by far the biggest exporter of plastic products in 2023, followed by Germany and the U.S., according to the Plastics Industry Association.

Together, the three nations account for 33% of the total global plastics trade, the association said.

The United States supports having an article in the treaty that addresses supply, or plastic production, a senior member of the U.S. delegation told The Associated Press Saturday.

Less than 10% of plastics are recycled. Most of the world’s plastic goes to landfills, pollutes the environment, or is burned.

Sarah Dunlop, head of plastics and human health at the Minderoo Foundation, said chemicals are leaching out of plastics and “making us sick.”

The International Indigenous Peoples Forum on Plastics held an event about the impact of plastics Saturday on the sidelines of the talks. They want the treaty to fully recognize their rights, and the universal human right to a healthy, clean, safe and sustainable environment. Juan Mancias of the Carrizo/Comecrudo Nation in Texas spoke about feeling a spiritual connection to the land.

“Five hundred years ago, we had clean water, clean air and there was no plastics,” he said. “What happened?”

About 40% of all plastics are used in packaging, according to the UN. This includes single-use plastic food and beverage containers — water bottles, takeout containers, coffee lids, straws and shopping bags — that often end up polluting the environment.

U.N. Environment Program Executive Director Inger Andersen told negotiators in Busan the treaty must tackle this problem.

“Are there specific plastic items that we can live without, those that so often leak into the environment? Are there alternatives to these items? This is an issue we must agree on,” she said.

The Associated Press’ climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.

People pass by an electric display board calling for a reduction in plastic production near the venue for the fifth session of the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee on Plastic Pollution in Busan, South Korea, Saturday, Nov. 30, 2024. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)

A display board shows a call for a reduction in plastic production during the fifth session of the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee on Plastic Pollution, at a taxi station in Busan, South Korea, Saturday, Nov. 30, 2024. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)

A screen shows Greenpeace activists boarding a tanker on Saturday, to demand that nations agree to reduce plastic production, during a press conference of Greenpeace at the fifth session of the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee on Plastic Pollution in Busan, South Korea, Saturday, Nov. 30, 2024. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)

Graham Forbes, Greenpeace Head of Delegation to the Global Plastics Treaty Negotiations, speaks during a press conference at the fifth session of the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee on Plastic Pollution in Busan, South Korea, Saturday, Nov. 30, 2024. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)

Juan Benito Marcias, a member of The International Indigenous Peoples' Forum on Plastic, speaks during a press conference at the fifth session of the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee on Plastic Pollution in Busan, South Korea, Saturday, Nov. 30 2024. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)

Juan Carlos Monterrey, right, head of Panama's delegation, speaks before a press conference of members of The International Indigenous Peoples' Forum on Plastics at the fifth session of the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee on Plastic Pollution in Busan, South Korea, Saturday, Nov. 30, 2024. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)

Members of The International Indigenous Peoples' Forum on Plastics attend a press conference at the fifth session of the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee on Plastic Pollution in Busan, South Korea, Saturday, Nov. 30, 2024. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)