My version of slip trailing

These bowls are so fun to make. These large bowls 20-27 inches across are like a huge blank canvas, they beg to be decorated.  The bowls below are decorated using slip trailing techniques.  Slip is about 50% clay 50% water.  I add between 1% and 5% mason stain (which come in a variety of colors) to achieve the desired color affect.  The dots on these two bowls were hand piped using a cake decorating bag and various tips.  You can feel the dots, which adds and interesting texture and depth to the finished piece.

 I try to keep a professional portfolio of my work, unfortunately in a professional picture you can't tell the size of the piece.  I try to include the size as often as I can but... I still get people asking how big an object "really" is.  I meditated on this for a while and I realized that I have very few pictures of my pottery in a real life setting.  I am going to try to remedy this in the future.  My brother's an amazing carpenter.  I described the shelving I wanted for Swiss Day's from a partial picture a quick sketch and a verbal description, and two weeks later I had the exact shelves I had seen in my head.  As we are no longer in festival season so I'm going to put the shelves in my living room as display shelving.  My hope is that I will be able to take some pictures of my pieces on display to better explain sizing.

The Harvest

In an effort to create balance in my life I try not to work in the studio on Saturday's.  I'm there the rest of the week teaching and working, so for the benefit of my family I have agreed to be at home both physically and mentally (those of you who are passionate about your work know what I mean). This doesn't always work.  I seem to find myself going to gallery's, art fairs, or friends shops, on the weekends more than not, but my husband helps me know when it's family time.  Hunting is family time, I don't remember my mom ever buying meat from the store growing up.  We harvested our meat in the fall and lived off the protein rich meat throughout the winter.  Bringing home a rated buck is still a thrill but I wouldn't consider myself a "trophy hunter" we hunt so we have enough meat to make it through the winter.  If we don't need the meat we don't put in for the hunt.  If we can't find a healthy mature animal, we don't take the shot.  If we can't make the shot, we won't take it.  We were taught never to leave a wounded animal in the forest.  Most of the time our "hunts" turn into little more than great horse rides as a family, time spent together laughing and reminiscing without interruption is invaluable to my family.   As an adult I value the health benefits of the natural meat, as well as the responsibility we have as hunters and citizens of the earth to protect and maintain a healthy heard.   As a hunter I value the lesson's my Dad instilled in me throughout our family time growing up.  Although Marshall and I have no children of our own we look forward to shairing these lessons with our own children some day. 

 

Magic is the favorite of all the grand kids.  His tail touches the ground and his bangs are.... well you can see for yourself.  I wonder sometimes how he finds his way back down the mountain.  He's surprisingly sure footed.  

Huge Leaf Motif

I've received many questions about my leaf platters, so let me tell you a little ditty about them.  They are platters approximately 24-30 inches across.  They are thrown from one piece of clay on the potters wheel and have an impression from one large leaf; yes, only one.
They were quite the adventure to make.  I do not love leafs in pottery most of the time. I think it looks unoriginal and many times like the potter didn't know what else to do, so they threw a leaf on it.  That  being said, I have had several requests for pottery with a leaf motif.  I'm not against this conceptually in fact quite the opposite.  I've been waiting for the right inspiration to come to me so that I could create something of this nature and still show my expression as an artist.
Here's how it began. . .  This last July I was on a horse ride with my dad and sister up south-fork canyon when I saw these HUGE leafs due to the moisture we have had in Utah this year.  The giant leaves were everywhere,  I began to wonder if I could throw a platter big enough that I could get the whole leaf's impression into it (these leaves really were that big).  So I jumped off my horse in a thicket of stinging nettle up to my armpit and started gathering leaves.  I'm pretty sure it looked like I was out of my mind.  The stock of these plants was about 3/4 to 1/2 inch thick and by the time we got back to the trailer literally 15 minutes later they had wilted completely and were no good. I was so bummed.  I had finally found a way in which I could incorporated the leafs and still maintain my integral artistry.  But, never one to accept defeat, we planned to go on another horse ride within the week.  Sure enough, we found a field of the same huge leafs just below Provo peak. Utah has had a big water and spring run off the last couple of years, combine that with the lack of wildfires and it was like being in another world, there was so much undergrowth and greenery.  After seeking out and gathering the largest leafs we could find, my family and I flew down the mountain in an attempt to get to water before the leafs wilted again.  I held the leafs in a bottle of water on my lap all the way home and immediately stored them in a refrigerator.  (Thanks mom, for allowing these giant leafs to monopolize your fridge.)
What a roller coster ride! In the end there were three successful attempts, but only two made it out of the kiln.   I can only make them once a year for a two week time period and at a 50% success rate, but they are absolutely worth the work.
I am a summer girl, but this makes the winter wait impossible.  I am excited to try this technique again next year.

Still warm in the kiln!

Remember that clay shrinks approximately 20% throughout the working process. In other words these were 20% bigger.  Think about how awesome that is.

I love the ZOO!!

I don't know how many people know this about me but, I love the Zoo, and I mean any and all Zoo's.  Hogle Zoo is the official zoo in utah.  I am a home grown Utahan I've lived within 300 miles of where I was born my hole life, but the first time I went to our local zoo was with my husband 2 years ago.  Hogle zoo isn't a very big zoo, you can speed walk the entire zoo in about 15 min. but for me this is at least a half day event, sometimes more.  Like this weekend for example.  On August 10 there was a baby elephant born at the zoo, it went on exhibition friday Sept 11.  It has been on my calendar since they announced the day the baby would go on exhibit.  My husband and I weren't able to go up on opening day, but we made it up to see Zuri this weekend.  When in your life do you get to see a month old baby elephant?  I was worse than all the little kids.  I worked my way around to the front of the exhibit where the stadium seating is, and parked it.  The baby elephant is soooo cute.  It must be baby season at the zoo because there was also a baby giraffe and three baby tigers.  I had so much fun spending the day with my hubby.

Favorite Mugs

O my goodness, I love these mugs.  I should have waited for the professional pictures to post, but I just couldn't stand it.  I had to show you.  I took these out of a hot kiln last saturday at 6:00 in the morning.  I couldn't wait! I was supposed to be at my mom's house where we were all going to car pool up to Swiss Days.  Instead, I was picking through a hot kiln shaking with excitement at the new arrivals.  This is why I do this folks . . . it's all about Christmas for me.  I grabbed as many mugs as I could carry, and was off to my mom's house where they were ready to send out a search party.  I've been staring at them for a week now and still love them.  (sidebar) I met the nicest folks from Idaho during Swiss Days.  After perusing the booth for about 15 min the gentleman said to me that he was looking for something he could critique about my work, and said he could find nothing.   Well, this is it!  I can never wait for the kiln to completely cool.  This impatience can cause several problems such as; breakage from heat shock, glaze crackling or crazing within the glaze.  In general a kiln should be left to cool for about twice as long as it was fired or until the pots can be touched and unloaded will bare hands. The best you'll get from me is waiting until paper won't burn in the peeps, which is at 451 degrees. These mugs are a perfect example of my impatience, they were still hot when I arrived at my mom's house to show everyone my prize.  I hope you love them as much as I do.  I'll have professional pictures up soon.

Midway Swiss Days

I had so much fun this Labor day weekend as the Midway Swiss Days.  I had so much fun meeting new friends and visiting with old ones.  Thanks to all of you who took the time to come out and support me and the Swiss Day's organization for having us there.  Thanks to all those who helped me this year at in the booth.  Mom for sitting with me for two days in the heat, Jillian for making us laugh when we wanted to sleep, and Curtis my mom's newly adopted son.  This was a great experience for me.  Here are some fun pictures of me and my booth.

Lab Assistant

I have two giant beautiful Newfoundland dogs.  This is Bailey she came to visit me in the studio the other day, where she promptly decided the best way she could help was by taking a nap in the middle of the glaze room. Of course this occurred while I was frantically trying to finish glazing a set of new bowls.  Again, I am reminded that my dogs have no concept of their large size and are at heart, lap dogs.  I had just picked her up from the Vet and I think she needed a little extra love.

New business card day!

The debate has finally ended!  I have chosen a business card . . . And ordered it. They came to my house yesterday and  I love them.  I think they fit my personality perfectly, and it's a great face for my business.  If you want some to hand out, shoot me an e-mail and I will get some to you.

New Slide Shows

Enjoy the new Pic's. . . I love the red on the rim of these bowls.

While I'm waiting for cone ten to drop.

Cones are used in ceramics to monitor the interior temperature of the kiln. Simply put they are triangles of clay formulated to melt at specific temperatures.  I fire my kilns to cone ten which is approximately 2381 degrees fahrenheit.  My cone pack only has three gages, cone 8, 9, & 10.  Everything else I calculate by the color of the kiln and a good old gut feeling (I know somewhere my college professor just cringed).  I've included a picture of my "cone pack" before and after.

I love this girl.

I brought some mugs to a family dinner thinking I would have some extra time while visiting to assemble a few handles and embellishments.  As soon as the clay came out of the car the spark of inquisitive fire came alive in my nieces eyes. She sat next to me for almost 2 hours making, snakes, dragons, princesses in distress, and telling stories in my favorite english accent (she's 5).  Most importantly though, she might be the best "glue" (slip) application expert I have ever worked with.  Anytime I needed some "glue" and a few times when I didn't she would happily put down her clay friends load up the paint brush, and heap an exorbitant amount of slip onto the dime size spot I had pointed to. Awesome! I probably will have to replace a few paint brushes and a few mugs bit the dust, but spending time with this girl is priceless.  She even named the mugs, all of them, they are exactly the same. I hope she never loses her imagination.  Thanks for all the help baby girl.                                        

Great Accomplishments.

Tonight, in an effort to show more of my work on the blog, I opened a photo-bucked account. Two computers and one fake punch at the screen later, one could find me jumping up and down clapping with joy at my very small accomplishment.  Enjoy the new slide shows.

It's Christmas!!!

In Ceramics when a glaze fire finishes and the kiln is ready to be cracked it is often called Christmas, you never know what you are going to get. Today was Christmas for me. I am so excited for this firing because a couple of my photo transfer cake platers were in it. It's not my tightest packed kiln but I'm happy with the results.

Here we go. . .

This week my Mom and baby sister came to the studio armed with cameras to capture me at work. When they got to the studio I was up to my elbows in ink transfer chemicals. I have been interested in ink transfers on ceramics for a while, but really got into photo transfering in order to teach a class with my friend Spencer Davis at the Utah Art Educators Association (UAEA) conference this past spring. I love the antique, faded look that this process can produce.