Thursday, July 28, 2011

So one day I swear I'll have better pics.


I just finished my second week of teaching for the new session at Beech Grove Clay Works. Woohoo, I'm the official artist in residence now!  I went to the library and Half Price Books and got a ton of ceramics books, including a huge glaze recipe book, and a book on handmade tiles. I've got plans to do a ton of glaze testing! I am determined to get the perfect pink glaze, as well as some nice copper blue glazes. I will be sure to share my results as I go!

My first week, I taught some basic slab building projects - footed and paddled cups with and without a handle, with white slip and sgraffito surface decoration (totally Ayumi Horie inspired - but I talk about her to the students so much, it was inevitable that I'd demo her technique. I ♥ her work!) This week, I did basic wheel throwing, focusing on wedging and centering techniques, and throwing a simple bowl. It's going pretty well so far, and the students all seem to be enjoying themselves. Also, my mother-in-law signed up for the class, and while she had absolutely no patience for the wheel, we are working on doing a tile project together for the kitchen. I'm pretty excited about it! It's also nice getting to make work for myself that I can also use as a demo. A friend of mine wants a large cookie jar, so that was my demo for the more advanced wheel throwing students. It feels so good to get so much work done!

I know you're probably tired of seeing crappy cell phone pics of everything. I know I am, especially since I have a fairly decent digital camera that I just never remember to bring to the studio. I fully intend to take some real slides of my work this week, because I am inspired by my twitter friend's blog post about photographing her ceramics. Check it out, her pics look great!

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