This past week I’ve been work on the last of two pieces. This is my portable nebulizer and it’s mouth piece for the breathing treatments I had to do as a kid with pneumonia. Over fall break I’m going to attempt to throw the last piece on the wheel which is like an egg shaped humidifier. We will see how that goes since I’m not the greatest on the wheel and I’m attempting to throw it in parts.
So this week I made two more molds I have one final one and I should be done with mold making for the semester. I trimmed the two surviving cups I threw and I also threw two more this week. I was able to get when quite talk and thin. These two new cups are drying out a little so I can start trimming them. This week I’ll be making the last two sculpture pieces for my installation piece that I’m hoping to show at the end of October.
This week I finished making my lungs. They are currently drying out very slowly and will be bisqued soon. Also Mandi let me narrow their watercolor underglaze a to experiment with. Last week I threw on the wheel 4 pieces where made but this week do to compression issues cracked formed in the bottoms of two so only two survived in total so far.
So this week I worked on a set of lungs. I hope to make a humors piece that touches on the traumatic pneumonia stent I had as a child. In the critique it was pointed out that there is a level of humor to my work which makes sense that’s how my family process trauma. This critique was a reminder that despite series issues I can still deal with them in a humors way. This gave me some ideas for my rib piece. Also I practiced throwing on the wheel in anticipation for our of campus show this fall. I made for decent size pieces but it is porcelain so it’s probably gonna shrink quite a bit.
So this week we got some more work done. I popped my molds I finshed into plaster fridge to dry. They don’t seem to be dry all the way through yet. Also I made 3 cylinders for a set of lungs I’m making. This week I also had to revise my artist statement which is really hard. I’m working on it as much as I can. Also I need to go by a Little amount of resin and eastern paper to experiment with.
This week I did I bunch of underglaze tests from store bought underglazes. I did find an underglaze recipe on glazy.org that I would like to try. I also decorated two test pieces with some new tools with underglaze to see how the patterns as well as colors work together. And I started a red meat lollipop rib piece. I have to finish the back half so I can then make a mold of it.
So this week I did slip casting so I can test the transparency of the clay I was using. Unfortunately I forgot to take photos of the pieces before they went into the kiln so all you see is the mess left over from the casting. Also I started sculpting a breast that I can then make a mold of later. I’m still trying to figure out what I want to create and focus on this semester. I’m struggling a little bit I did make some things this week so that’s better than nothing at all. It has been a really long weekend.
This week I don’t really have much work to show because it was the first week of the semester. We are supposed to write our plan for the semester but I’m not concrete on what I want to do. I know I want to work with slip casting so that’s something I’m going to pursue. I want to make my own molds and I want to slip cast multiple pieces. Right now I’m interested in how ceramic and light works together so I want to work with the transparency of porcelain slip to see how I can layer it and have it play off of one another. I’d like to create at least two pieces by the end of the semester but I’m not sure if that’s an okay amount in fine having to create more. I’d like these pieces to center on my brother and I and our health issues as well as how our families health issues might/can/ and have affected use and possible our future families down the road.
So we wrapped up the semester with a wood fire which is super dope. Fired it for 48 hrs over the weekend. I unfortunately burnt myself. It wasn’t super bad but it was definitely painful and I might have some white scars from the little tiny blister or two I got. Remember kids, wear pants and long sleeves to a wood fire! This up coming week we finish the whole semester with an online critique on Thursday, unloading the wood kiln Thursday, as well as a clean up on Friday. This has been both the shortest and longest semester but I’m glad I made it and can’t wait for what summer brings.
So this week I worked mainly on my obstructions. I used my stringed bored to take pictures to create a sort of flip book that will be kinda like a stop motion video. My next obstruction revolved around a photo. I layered strips of clay to create the different value shades then I back lit it to get a photo. I also fired my self directed study project. Unfortunately one of the fishes tales didn’t make it. I still have enough to show what I was exploring.
