May-June 09, Southern Pottery Session No. 3

I thought this was a particularly successful session at Southern Pottery.  I was pleased with the finishes on these pieces: the glazes were something I was proud of.  For the most part, the forms were light and functional.  Many were gifts, and if I didn't give them away then I use them regularly at home.

 

A vase with dogwood motif.  This piece was a wedding gift for Matthew's step sister and her husband, Kristin and Matthew.  This is still one of my favorite pieces.  Though it was quite heavy the form was well proportioned.  The glaze is double dipped: gloria's ace with robin's egg blue on top.  The glazes were wiped clean with water on the flower and petals, and I then reapplied a white glaze to those surfaces.  The green was even where it needed to be and then broke in the right places along the leaf margins.  I learned alot from this piece about building taller forms, working with clay in the leather-hard state, and applying clay appliques. 

This pitcher I made for mom.  It was my first real success working with the pitcher form.  I love the spout here; I altered the piece by cutting away at some of the height.  And it is a particularly well shaped handle.  The only really issue is that it is a bit shorter than I would have liked (about 8").   The proportions are sound, which is one reason I like it.  It functions well; pours well.  I spent alot of time in future sessions trying to recreate a larger version of this form.

 

I love this green color.  The only problem is that to achieve it requires completely dipping the pieces in two baths of glaze.  This causes the glazes often to become heavy at the bottom and can drip onto the kiln shelves, causing a real mess all the way around.  

  

An attempt a different pitcher form.  I really liked this piece, but the base of the handle broke during a firing.  The success of these pieces were in the design with the wax resist.  Where you apply wax on bisque fired ceramics glaze does not adhere.  So I painted these designs on the pieces with hot wax and then glazed with the robin's egg blue.  The area of orange you see are untreated fired clay.  Though time consuming I really like the world of options this process offered me and really began an new realm of surface design for me to explore.

Art 220: Project 4 "Mythical Creature"

The final project of the semester was quite a unique one.  We were to create a mythical creature, combining three different types of animals:  one that travels by land, air, and sea.  We chose the animals randomly, drew them from a hat.  The creatures I drew were a crane, a whale, and a meerkat.

 

Quite the odd combination.  Quite the odd assignment I thought... especially for someone who doesn't really have the gene that allows me to see animals as 'cute'.  Typically.  And so it really surprised me how quickly I took to this assignment, and how much I found myself enjoying the creation of animal figures.

I loved the graceful neck and face of the crane (actually, I studied egrets, as they are very similar to cranes and are native to Louisiana).  I decided to make the neck and face of the crane a central part of the design of the creature.  The most distinctive feature of the meerkat is the way they stand on their back legs, letting their forearms hang.  When they stand like that they have a very human quality.  This upright stance and short arms is the characteristic I chose to bring forward to the mythical creature.  The tail of the whale is a signature feature and quite recognizable and it turned out to be a graceful conclusion to the piece.

The construction of the piece was quite intuitive and I used a combination of all the building methods I learned throughout the semester.  Beginning with the body I constructed a large slab.  I created the basic arched form of the body out of a mass of newspaper twisted together.  I draped and wrapped the slab around the newspaper form.  The paper burns in the firing of the piece, leaving the clay form after it is strong enough to support itself.  I used similar method for the arms, creating small newspaper forms and then coil-building clay around those forms.

I successfully built the neck of the 'Cralekat' out of coils.  I was well aware that I could run into the same problem I did with the trophy, having the clay dry too quickly, and having too much weight (in the head) being supported by a narrow stem of clay.  I learned so much in this process: the limits of the clay and what can be accomplished at each state of dryness.  The tail was made from slabs, trimmed and shaped using newspaper.  I added texture to the back, mimicking that of feathers.  Detail was etched in the features of the beak and face.  The creature came to life relatively quickly (maybe just 4 class periods were spent constructing it).

The time came to bisque fire the piece and then begin glazing.  I had given no thought to the colors I wanted to use and the effects I wanted to create.  But it didn't matter.  During the kiln firing a classmate's piece exploded next to mine and the cralekat became a causality.   Broken at the neck, the beak, and the tail.  So, no additional glazes or kiln firings would be possible.  I used 'JB Weld' clear epoxy to glue the pieces back together.  At least I wanted to have some record of the form created.  I think it might be a nice lawn ornament, a sculpture to guard over the veggie garden.

Art 220: Project 3 "The Cake"

The aim of this assignment was to build a tiered sculpture out of clay slabs.  The most obvious form this method lends itself to is a wedding cake, and this is what our instructor encouraged us to build.  That may be fun for some girls, but I was turned off by the cliché.  I went a different direction, creating another design speaking to Matthew and the objects his dedication to medicine has brought into our life.  Instead of a cake, the sculpture is simply a tiered stack of study paraphernalia:  a laptop, a textbook, bagels and a coffee cup and saucer.

The skills we learned included how to use a slab roller, the proper depth of the slab, and how to join the slab members by slipping and scoring and then blending a coil between the members.  The fun part for me was constructing the object.  I created a template for the sizes of each of the rectilinear surfaces and built the laptop and the book.  It seemed rather straight forward and logical process to me, a designer who regularly draws construction details... but many of my classmates struggled to put all the pieces together.  Glad to see my previous schooling is relevant to this field of study.

It is important that all the pieces have a hole to allow air to escape.  When air is trapped in clay it will explode when it is fired in the kiln.

The bagels were made by pushing a dowel through a thick coil, then rolling the clay around the dowel to smooth the surface.  Remove the dowel and gently bend the tube-like form into a sphere and join the ends.  The saucer and cup were made using basic pinch-pot methods.

I was a little disappointed in the glazing results, which is typical at this point.  The computer (which is quite an accurate rendering of the early laptop Matthew had when he was an undergrad) is a metallic black glaze.  I used the iron oxcide to add a luster to what would have been a flat black.  For the book I used the straight Gloria's Ace glaze.  I etched 'Emergency Medicine' on the spine of the book and the Gloria's Ace broke well, allowing the etching to become apparent.  The color which is between a maroon, tan, and brown fires in irregular pattern and it gave a weathered character to the book.  The pages of the book were a 'wash', not a glaze.  Washes are flat.  I applied 2-3 coats of the wash and I felt it fired too dark.  The bagels were an 'Old Gold' glaze.  The coffee cup came out too yellow I thought... the intended color was a pale cream, just off pure white.  Perhaps again I applied too many coats; the result being yellow instead of eggshell white.

What I like about this piece is that it completely blends into the typical clutter in our house.  It sits on our office desk and when I point it out to friends you can tell it was completely camouflaged.

 

Recent Knits

I apologize for the lag between posts... it's not due to lack of projects.  Excitement about the next project on the horizon often moves me forward before I have time to reflect on the one I just completed.  There was the end of the semester and a rush to finish those projects, and then there were the holidays, and so I am behind.

These two knitting projects were quick and both had pressing deadlines: babies!  (From what I hear their demands never do stop :).  Both very special kids with parents who are dear friends.  (I have so many dear friends with amazing children and I often wish I had time to knit for all of them).  As luck had it Matthew has been working the night shift for over a month and I had plenty of time to myself for knitting.

This was a hat for Baby Jack.  Jack's father is a friend from college, so I chose our alma mater's colors.  Jack also lives in New Orleans and I figured this could also double as appropriate Mardi Gras attire.   The yarn is 'Debbie Bliss Cathay', a blend of cotton, viscose microfiber, and silk, 1 skein purple and 1 skein gold.  I didn't have a pattern for the hat and it was my first time knitting a hat for a baby, so I started by doing a little research.  The circumference of a baby's head ranges from 13"-17".  I determined the gauge of my yarn which was 4.5 stitches per inch (with two strands held together) on my US size 7, 12" circular needles.  I cast on 64 stitches in the round, which theoretically would create a hat 14.2" round.  I started with a 2x2 rib in gold, then began alternating the colors in stockinette stitch for the body.  After about 5-6" I started decreasing by knitting two together every eighth stitch.  Continue decreasing in intervals of 8 (stitch markers help with this) every other row.  Overall I think it was successful, though when we tried it on Jack it was a bit large... but with babies room to grow is always a good thing.

This next project was a bit more involved, and a couple of weeks of marathon knitting were required to finish the piece before the baby shower last weekend.  But I was so pleased with the baby cape for Baby Barden.  Baby Barden is female, and her red-headed mother is a dear friend and knitting partner from my Atlanta days.  She and I often admired this pattern in my favorite knitting book, 'Knit 2 Together' by Tracey Ullman and Mel Clark.

The pattern is 'Daphne's Baby Cape', and surprisingly I didn't stray far from the instructions (which I have a bad habit of doing).  I used a worsted spun fine wool, 'Shepherd's Wool' by Stonehedge Fiber Mill, color 'Christmas Red'.  Four skeins were required rather than the three called for in the pattern.  The cape wasn't too complicated to construct.  If anything the rows and rows of garter stitch at such a fine gauge was rather monotonous.  It is definitely a pattern that requires some stamina.  But I was so very pleased with the finished piece, and hopefully next year this 'red riding hood' will be the perfect fit for Baby Barden.