The Wopperjawed Pot

By: ornamento.blog
Art, Ceramics, Fleisher Art Memorial, pottery, , , , 2 Comments on The Wopperjawed Pot

Woppy Jawed,  Wapper Jawed,  Whopperjawed,  Whomperjawed.  What do these words mean?    Something that’s askew.  Crooked.  Not straight.  Uneven, even.  And they all apply to my work.  I come from the measure three times and cut for the rest of the day school of crafting.  I wonder how I ever managed to make two quilts.  I used to fret about my crooked lines and uneven seams.  But as I got older, I got smarter.  Or maybe wiser (in the Equus africanus asinus sense, of course).  I embraced my flaws, including my wopperjawdiddidity. (I made up that word in case you’re wondering.)    Hence the Wopperjawed Pot.    The  Wopperjawed Pot is about 12 inches tall and is hand-built of white earthenware using the tarpaper technique.  I used colored underglazes,  stains, and chalks for the surface decoration.  Everything is covered with a clear matte glaze.  It took third place in ceramics in the Fleisher Art Memorial Student Show (the 120th annual!) and was the inspiration for the menorah.  Which is also wopperjawed.   Here are some pictures.

 

 

 

 

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The Picasso Vase

By: ornamento.blog
Art, inspiration, pottery, Techniques, , , , 3 Comments on The Picasso Vase

I made a Picasso vase.  Or rather, the other people in the studio started calling the vase The Picasso Vase before I ever thought of it.  Probably because of the shape which would have been impossible to achieve without the tar paper technique (which I also used to make the menorah.)
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You can from the picture above see how difficult it would have been to support the vase in its wet state without the tar paper to support it.  It was three wet slabs with beveled edges, scored and pinched together.

 

    Paper covered vase on left (upside down).  Bone dry vase before bisque firing on the right.

If the vase was to be an homage to Picasso, I needed to decorate it with Picasso-style images.  I decided on a cat, a mouse, and a fish.   Here are some preliminary sketches I made for the mouse.  I started with realistic drawings and got more abstract as I went.

 

I had no problem deciding on the cat portion and the fish came to me all at once.

 

Here are the designs for the mouse and fish,  drawn on the bisque-fired vase with an underglaze pencil.

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The cat in progress.  I used underglaze chalks and liquid underglazes for color.

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        Right out of the kiln.

 

 

The finished vase.

 

Tarpaper Technique

By: ornamento.blog
Art, Ceramics, Fleisher Art Memorial, pottery, , , , 4 Comments on Tarpaper Technique

 

I am having a good time in the pottery studio experimenting with the tar paper technique.   The items below are white earthenware in different stages of finishing.  The tar paper supports the soft clay slabs and allows you to make all kinds of crazy shapes. Of course I have to see how far I can push it.  Stay tuned.

 

 

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Beware of sharks in the slip bucket!

 

Pottery Experiments

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And that is what they are:  experiments.  I spent the summer trying different hand building techniques and seeing what I could do with white porcelain.  I threw a lot of what I made away mostly because of mishaps during the glaze firing.  And I made a few pounds of unglazed beads, pendants and trinkets that are colored with Mason stains. Those will get a ride in the rock tumbler which should give them a smooth, shiny satin finish.  I also made a few  bead trees so I can make glazed beads.  So, here is what I ended up with:

 

Some bangles (I wish I had made more of these) some nerikomi dishes, one mug, a platter with a feathered slip design, and two mid-century modern-looking vases that I will find good homes for.

Last Summer Class at The Clay Studio

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I spent my last class at The Clay Studio this Summer glazing and glazing.  We have to have everything off our shelves and ready to be fired by the end of the week.  And because it was the last class, we all brought food to “celebrate.”  Since it is a morning class, I brought doughnuts. Or I had planned to bring doughnuts.  I made the mistake of leaving them in a plastic bag on the counter last night.   When I got to them this morning, they were crushed to crumbs and there was a hole ripped in the bag.  The culprit?  


BOORIS!

BORIS!

Boris came to live with us exactly one year ago and he has gone from a timid, scared jumpy cat who sleeps all the time into a little feisty feline felon.  This is his house now and he is not about to let us forget it.

On to the pottery

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The above pieces are white porcelain with underglaze surface decoration.  They’ll get glazed with a clear satin matte glaze.

The pieces below are nerikomi fired at cone 6 and unglazed.

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TCS

I plan to take more classes at The Clay Studio, but in the Fall, I am returning to Fleisher.

What I am Doing This Summer

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7.Veneer

Making  veneers for vessels using white porcelain and Mason stains.  I made this one into a vessel that should be coming out of the bisque fire soon.

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Making porcelain pendants and beads.  The pieces in the above photo will need a bisque firing after they dry completely, and then a cone 6 fire.

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Here are some pieces that have already been fired at cone 6.  They are not glazed;  I finish them in a rock tumbler which gives them a smooth satin finish.

 

And here are some tiny glazed ring bowls with just a touch of gold.  I plan to make some more of these.

(Some of) What I Made (Last) Year

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Made in the pottery studio, that is.  I experimented with hand-built forms, screen printing and  textures, and made glazed ceramic beads for the first time.

 

 

 

But now it’s next year and I am off in new directions.  I think I’m finally finding my way. I will post pictures of my newer work soon.

 

The Kiln Waster

By: ornamento.blog
Art, London, pottery, Travel, V&A, , , , , Leave a Comment on The Kiln Waster

I had jury duty and when you are on jury duty in Philadelphia, you bring a few books, maybe a crossword puzzle, some snacks and whatever else allows you to pass the time because there is a lot of waiting before you are either selected to serve on a jury or dismissed. You serve for one day or one trial. 

I brought a couple of old catalogs from a pottery auction in the early 1990s.  I spent my waiting time pouring through pictures of work by the likes of  Bernard Leach, Lucie Rie, and  Mary Rogers.  

Which brings me to The Kiln Waster.  The Kiln Waster  is the opposite of inspiration.  If it were possible to have a front-end car collision in a kiln, The Kiln Waster would be the result.  See for yourself:

Kiln Waster refers to tin-glazed earthenware dishes that collapse in a kiln during firing and fuse to each other and to the  kiln furniture.  The above example is from Delft, Holland  circa 1655.  

I came face to face (or face to plate) with the Kiln Waster at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London.   I had gone to the V&A to see its well-known jewelry collection.    I did not know, however, was that the V&A is also home to a fabulous, HUGE (huge as in rooms and rooms and shelves upon shelves) collection of ceramics and pottery dating from ancient times to the present day.  And while pottery from the Americas is not largely represented,  you’ll find just about everything else in the V&A collection.

Unfortunately, the V&A does not have a book or catalog of the collection for sale in its museum shop.  I would would have loved to buy one.  But the museum allowed visitors to take pictures and I snapped and gawked and gawked and snapped.    If you get to London, run to the V&A to see this astounding collection.  The next time I am in London, I plan to go back.  If you want to search the collection online, press here.

Here are some  pictures of pottery that fared better than The Kiln Waster

Jin Dynasty China 1100-1200

 

 

 

 

No One Creates Alone

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Art, art, creativity, crafts, inspiration, creativity, pottery, , , , Leave a Comment on No One Creates Alone

That’s one of the conclusions reached in an article I recently read in Psychology Today. Another one is that “discovery cannot be produced by chance.” In other words, someone who has not logged sufficient time in pursuit of a given endeavor does not have the tools to recognize a significant discovery.     Read the article for yourself and see what you think, Deciding to Create.  

My creative pursuits have been proceeding by fits and starts.  I have thrown away almost all of the pottery that I have made this year because of glaze disasters and “what was I thinking?” moments.  But I am learning and trying new things.  And I am very fortunate to share studio time with some creative and generous people.

Here are some pictures of a few things I made last year.