wintery wares

here's a few things just out of the kiln with a wintery theme...tiny sneak peek at what will be at the Owl this weekend...

here's the mug from previous process post, finished:

another moose mug: white slip trailing on white slip...even though there's no snow here, well there is thick frost some mornings....

a wee white slip platter: who doesn't love bicycling in the winter?! and red berries, green leaves...seasonal hints:

caribou platter: hawthorny leaves, more red berries...

not to worry not everything is ungulates and bicycles (well okay i made LOTS of bicycles of various styles)...bears, herons, salmon, crows, foxes, hummingbirds, rubber boots, umbrellas, trees, etc...
and some new new things with my new new bike cranks and cogs stencils!

The OWL

well I am doing one fair this winter season - the Owl Fair in Fernwood!
come on down and check all the fine handmade goods...

process process process

have been spending A LOT of time in the studio lately, at all hours of the day...trying to keep on top of the seasonal inventory and ready for upcoming show...
here's a few process shots:

small dippers, from stencil, to slip, to leatherhard with the stencil off...

beginning a moose mug, stencil on clay

white slip over top and green slip trailing

more slip trailing

leatherhard and stencil off... will try to remember to photo the finished glazed mug....

a great showing

Well this years Etsy Made in Canada had a fabulous showing of support. So glad to see a September event so well attended and so many great makers out with their wares. Saw some long lost and far flung friends as well!
here's a couple of photos i took standing up on the chair behind my booth. it was so crowded i couldn't actually get out of my booth to take photos from other perspectives...

Handmade here we come

This Saturday is the annual ETSY Made in Canada Day.
Here in Victoria it's shaping up to be quite an event, rumours are there will be close to 100 makers there!
I will be there, so come on down if you are in town, to Market Square....

Notes from Red Deer, and onto the Filberg Festival!

I have just returned from Red Deer, Alberta, and a fun week teaching at the Red Deer College Series Summer Art School! Had a fabulous group of people ready to play with slip all week. Lots of laughing and lots of learning. Also enjoyed hanging out with the other instructors from various parts of North America. There was quite a BC contingent there this week! If you are in Alberta, or a reasonable travel distance, this is a great place to go to try anything from traditional drawing/painting, to hot glass, metal, printmaking, etc... the studios are truly great spaces to be.
here are a few shots from the week:

...a student working on a gorgeous monoprint - her first one! going whole hog right out of the gate.

...a golf plate with some slip trailing and dotting.

...birds eye view of part of the table at the back of the room that was filled with finished pieces (bon dry and leatherhard)

...an assortment of student pieces showing various techniques.

...another assortment.

....some tumblers and vase that i made as examples. one of the exercises i gave was to work on a series with some kind of visual narrative or continuity. these were inspired by the jackrabbits hopping about red deer campus!

...jackrabbit!

...fun sculpture in the hallways outside the ceramics studio.

...a shot of the yellow fields out the window as we drove back to Calgary airport.



...and coming right up is the Filberg Festival, where you can find me at the Dirty Girl Clayworks booth all weekend - July 31-Aug 3. Come by, say hi, and check out some of the latest things from the kiln!

Upcoming show!

come and say hello and check out my newest work!

spring handles

it had thought to pass over the whole "look at all the blossoms we have here" spring thing that happens here on the west coast…knowing friends and relations east of here are thigh deep in snow…
but, well, one blossom shot can't hurt. here's my little studio gallery with the plum tree in bloom (last week!)

and i have been contemplating handles and how one holds things and how many fingers and balance of mugs and such things for the past few months…finally sprung into action to play with a couple of handles:

handle # 1, i call the medium handle. can still get you whole hand in there, but doesn't take up quite so much of the mug:

handle # 2, i call the two finger handle, as you can get a couple of fingers in there:

the mug on the far left (navy blue) is the current handle for my regular mugs. it fits the whole hand with room to spare. large handed people like it… but i find it takes up a lot of mug and have never been completely happy with it's profile…

i am leaning towards handle #1. i like being able to still get all fingers in there and i like its profile and balance… while my current handle is pulled off the side of the mug, this new handle is pulled separately and attached leather hard.

well maybe i will make mugs with both the current and the new handles!

Art Show

if you are in Victoria come and check this art show at the Gage Gallery in Oak Bay. It's a photo show, and i have a couple of ceramic pieces (seen in process a few posts ago) in it : sgraffito platters based on my dad's photos:

playing with sgraffito

while i have been working on the large sgraffito platters from my dad's photos, i also took the down-time opportunity to work on figuring out dimensions for a pasta bowl. something wider and deeper than my regular bowls…so used some of the white clay (CKK6) and used them as sgraffito "warm-ups" for the photo pieces…

here's a couple of the bowls:

crow

quail

i enjoyed these. they were just fun, no pressure….

new stencil

working on a new set of stencils: bears!
here's a couple of process shots, testing, and adjusting. subtle adjustments, but they make a difference…

i try to keep the stencils for my regular wares pretty simple… so think i will leave them with just these highlight lines added for the time being. partly as they are slow to cut (even though this winter i have been blessed with a studio assistant who cuts lovely stencils for me!), and though they are reusable they do eventually wear/tear…

adventures in sgraffito

well, as much as i should be making mugs to restock after a fabulous xmas season… i am working on some large platters in WHITE!! clay. my dad asked if i would like to put some pieces into a photo show he is having at the gage gallery in february…so i said why not? and then i said what am i thinking? my work doesn't really mesh with his… and so after much pondering i thought to try some sgraffito pieces based on his photos. and so that's what i have ben working on and here are some process shots

this one is in process...

this one is finsihed and bone dry, ready for the bisque

this one is my finished test piece. you can see i was testing some colour on the bottom with a wash. still pondering whether to finish with colour on all pieces, or keep black and white, or some of each.....