Some people make art with paint, and others use pencil or clay. But Italian artist Maurizio Savini prefers to use bright pink gum--after it has been chewed. Savini makes huge sculptures of bears and even people out of used chewing gum. Each sculpture requires thousands of pieces of gum. "I like to use chewing gum because it seemed to me a material that can be used in many ways compared with those used by the conventional arts such as painting," Savini says. How does he do it? The process is a lot like working with clay. "I work the chewing gum when it is warm and shape it with a knife," says Savini. Then, he puts a chemical onto each gum sculpture to make the gum stay in place. Savini's sticky art has been shown in cities like London, Paris, and Rome, where he lives today. Savini isn't the only artist to work with gum. His pink sculptures have inspired artists all over the world to get creative with the sticky matter. London artist Ben Wilson paints small paintings onto flat pieces of chewed gum he finds stuck to streets and sidewalks. In Canada, Jason Kronenwald uses different colored gum to make portraits of famous people. Kronenwald seldom chews gum himself. Instead, his friends help chew gum for him while he's working. "At times it can make me _ , but I just pay attention to the colors I need and get the sculpture going," he says. In America, Jamie Marraccini's art depends on color, so he tests different kinds of gum before using them. To find out what color the chewed gum will become once hardened, he lets it age for up to six months. "I've created 30 works totaling more than 35,000 pieces of gum," says Marraccini. That's a lot of gum! So think twice the next time you throw away a wad of gum. Maybe what seems like trash could actually be the beginning of a great piece of art. Marraccini stores the gum for six months in order to   _  .
judge how hard it will be know whether it is still sweet examine what chemicals it contains see what color it will become