Noodling with slip

Noodling with slip!

This recipe:

from Meagan Chaney Gumpert's blogpost:

 

Pete Pinnell's White Slip:

40 OM4

40 Talc ( mine is grey , that's OK)

10 Silica

10 Nepheline Syenite

______________

 100

 

+10  Frit 3124

+7 Zircopax

(You can add a few drops( very few) of sodium silicate4 - a defloculant - makes in runnier and easier to apply with a slip bottle

Listed as low fire: however my pieces were first bisqued, then glazed and fired to cone 6

Bisqued trial slip trail tiles

Bisqued vase

Mix-Match !

Spoons!

A very recent interest:

''spoons''

Color test tiles

 For a few weeks I was obsessed in doing solely color test tiles.

(Thank you Eric of MIY for your patience in placing these irregular shaped thingys into the kiln, and never conplaining!)

Breaking the color-code remains a quest and a mystery

red clay !

My first 3 sculptural pieces in red clay:
an odd threesome!

to the left: ''Bowl with bathers''
center piece: ''dog urn''
to the right: ''entwined couple''

This red clay has a lot of grogg which makes it a fast sculpural medium with coarse details.

Yellow nude series

The yellow nudes series

A very short serie - but none the less a serie - inspired from yellow blooms early summer a few years back. Reality is: it takes me a while to develop, paint , photograph and post.

The use of the nude to me transcends time/social class and culture. They are part of  my imaginary mythological world of humanity.

My wish for these yellow nudes are a physical and emotional connection to the landscape : rest, contemplation and heroic vision.

 ''giant at rest''
(oil on canvas : 30'' x 30'')

 '' just contemplation''
(oil on canvas : 24'' x 48'' )

''Diana without her bow''
(oil on canvas: 20'' x 20'' )

Mutant

 Came out of the kiln intact. (back in March or April of this year)

All the pieces that I made in Florida ( November through May 2012/2013) are still in Florida.

When I will get back it will be time to:

decide !
How and especially What to glaze

''mutant''

One of my favorite

This bulbous vase sums up what winter into spring looks like to me, a few leaves floating on top, white and the promise of fragile shoots of lime green and tender lavender blooms

''winter into spring''

(Matt underglazes)

Bisque in waiting

Finally got some bisqued pieces.

I am giddy happy.
And, I am totally freaked -out

OK, I am afraid to mess things up and stay stuck in the land of MUDDY-COLOURS.

No colour is better than muddy-colour

Maybe less is better?

I must agree that the last experiment I put a lot of matter on that poor jar!

Here are a few pieces in waiting:

 ''She devil with wings'':

 a funny little squirrel - with removable cap, log and coffee mug : 

an imaginary cactus? flower pot:

 

What else is in the works?
greenware: A hare on a rock:

A member at our workshop called this next piece:

 ''the Frankenstein Baby'' , hum,,,,

it is a tentative sculpture of my brother at age 3 

( I hope to place a bucket of maple syrup in his hand )

I feel very insecure about this piece, and can't let go

of my negative criticism!

Ceramics: trouble in the land of fun and confidence

Yep!
I had already fears and ghosts clammering : watch-out! for cracks! cracks!

Everything cracks!

First pieces I saw in the workshop. O-O it cracked !
my first plate cracked, the three next ones cracked- no more plates for me! well you get to live with cracks. Get around them.

Baby sitting - the drying process:
For a few months, weeks I was in the dark. I saw my fellow workshop allies making pieces, firing them and bringing them home. I had not yet fired anything and my shelves were getting more and more full. I was keeping my pieces wrapped under plastic- and nothing was drying!!!! One day it dawned on me, and the wish to fire was greater than the fear of cracks, and I pulled those plastic bags off my pieces and they finally got to a stage dry enough to get kilned! HURRAY! big breakthrough!

Next challenge: get out off the  COLOR MUDYNESS MESS/RUT !!!! ( Jenny Mendes*, help!)

Here a carved jar, and it's Kerplunk present ugly realtity:

Dreams of  chartreuse lime green  gone! The piece lost most of it's carving and is stuck in the land of mudyness.

LESSON # 3: DO NOT REFER TO OTHER PEOPLES TEST TILES!!!!! the workshop wall of test tiles, the test tiles on the 5 gallon glaze buckets,etc,...

and, a reminder of previous lessons:

Lesson#1: stop freaking about cracking - and do something about it, experience, explore, get aquainted with the fallin-off of hands and legs and parts,... slow dry,...use magic mender for high fire,... still in process ( still won't tackle making a plate)

Lesson #2: remove plastic bags if you want piece to eventually become bone dry!

Now:
Lesson#3: Make your own test tiles!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

BUT HOW????????????????????????????????????????????????????????


*: Jenny Mendes is a goddess of color , clay. Master of creative and prolific work

1st clay piece firing stages

Going through some of the stages:

once kilned I covered the piece with cobalt oxide:

then, followed some workshop suggestions and sprayed some high fire (cone 6) antique white:

and here she is with a pot that I fired at least 4 times( love the crawl glaze inside! )

         

Clay, who would of known?

Started in November -joined a ceramics workshop : MYI Ceramics in Hollywood.
Who would of known? Well there were some hints. I always had this image of myself surrounded with a cloud of dust! like the''peanuts character'' well here I am- landed in the world of mud and Fire: Glorious , sensuous clay!

it's been a while!

Look what Santa brought home,

Finally! Gave my beloved sister Sylvia her finished painting! I am now a blondie!