Pepper Disaster

My latest firing was a complete and utter disaster. I fired the giant pepper, the one that is supposed to go to the mold maker later this month. It blew up and the kiln was a giant mess with fired blocks of clay spattered about and small pieces stuck to the glazed tiles that were also in the kiln. It was bad. Really bad. I actually had to take a couple of days to process all of it before being able to unload the mess. All that work, hours of sculpting, destroyed. Why can't I get this project off the ground? Is it really this hard to figure out? Maybe I made a mistake in firing. Here is a link to The Pepper Project if you would like to read further about it. http://anneinclayland.blogspot.com/2010/01/pepper-project.html



I wanted to leave the mess to sit a few days more but knew I'd have to deal with it at some point. Plus, I practice feng shui, and I knew it was really bad to leave sitting about for any period of time. It seemed silly to me, the need to mourn this piece. It's just a lump of clay for crying out loud! But I guess I love my work. Spending hours with these pieces, I get to know them. I create them. The pepper project was an idea born to me years ago. And obstacle after obstacle has been thrown in my way. When can I get one of these things made the way I want it?

I finally cleaned out the kiln to see what went on. Apparently the pepper blew out early in the firing (thanks to my cone packs http://anneinclayland.blogspot.com/2010/02/studio-time.html). I think I must have been told many years ago not to fire a solid block of clay. Probably in the ninth grade I learned this. And so I never did it. Then I guess I forgot, because I had never done it. So when sculpting the piece it didn't really occur to me that this was a bad idea. And the mold maker asked me to fire it in order to cast it. I guess there was an air pocket in the pepper, or probably several air pockets. What a mess...

Well the good news is that I was able to find someone to teach me to make molds. I recently wrote to one of the local art schools and asked the director if he had anyone. The school came up with a weekend workshop where the instructor shows a few different ways to cast molds. So that is coming up soon. I'll have to sculpt a new pepper for the class and see what he says about it.

Choosing Tiles for a New Piece

This week I am starting a new mosaic. I decided on a design, which is an octopus in the ocean. I am sticking with my sea themes again. I guess I am drawn to the ocean and the creatures that live there. It seems peaceful to me. Also, the organic textures that I put onto the tiles seem to work for many different things in the ocean. The size of the board is around 30" x 24" and will have a mirror. The newest place that is showing my work, http://www.fullcircleyoga.com/, has only small wall space and she had requested small pieces last time. I have a tendency to work big, so I have to reel myself in a lot of the time and remember that people don't always have a huge wall space to display my work. Plus with the wood board and the tiles and the grout, the mosaics are quite heavy.

I drew out the design and figured out where the Octopus will go and the mirror as well. I may end up cutting the board even smaller, but I hate to do that. The smaller the board, the smaller the pieces have to be, which takes longer for me to make, and it is actually harder for me to do because I have to do a lot of cutting and fitting in.

I chose the tiles and colors I'll be using for the piece. This is the scariest part of the mosaic for me. I'm afraid I'll choose the wrong color or texture and the design won't flow well. I could do it over if I had to, but that means starting from the beginning; making more tiles, waiting for the tiles to dry, firing, glazing, etc. When I make the tiles, I only make 2-3 sheets of each texture. I know it would make more sense to complete the design before making the tiles, but I just can't seem to work that way. I have tried to do that in the past, but for some reason I need all my materials ready before I can conceptualize a design. I need the board there to draw on, and the tiles there to study. Will this texture work for this scene? What color would work? Do I have the right color clay in the right texture to make the right color? All these things can feel overwhelming.

I don't think I like glazing either. I'm not a painter. I never was. I often wonder if it was that awful professor in college who berated me during every painting critique. I hope not. I can't let someone like that keep me from my art! I worked my ass off in that class. And cried every Wednesday morning at 10:30 when I got home from class. I was not the girl who cried during class... not me! Why was he so awful to me? I even had fellow students ask me why he hated me. I hope it was because he saw what an awesome artist I was. He was trying to beat the work out of me. Fucking Gaudnek. Then I had him again for BFA seminar and the guy was my best friend! He loved me! Maybe he saw that I was not a painter, so he wanted me to get the fuck out of his class. Anyway, enough time spent writing about him... So I have to paint my tiles this week and get them back into the kiln to fire so they are ready for my latest sea creature.

Test Glazes

I fired my kiln last weekend and got my new test glazes with the red clay. The firing went fine, no problems. Here is a photo of the cone pack after firing. You can see that the cones melted in comparison with the earlier photo. http://anneinclayland.blogspot.com/2010/02/studio-time.html


The glazes on the red clay look different than they do on the white clay. That is what I wanted to know! I am glad the firing went well, I just wish I had made better tiles for testing glazes. I guess I wasn't really thinking ahead when I made the tiles. Oh well, they work for what I need them to. Here is a photo of the glazes on the red clay.




And compare to some of the same glazes on the white clay:

Studio Time

This week I had to do a bunch of studio maintenance; cleaning, organizing, and other non-creative projects. Sometimes I wish I had an assistant to do such things for me! Ha! One thing I did was make cone packs with some leftover clay. Cone packs are used to test the temperature of the kiln when it is firing. If the kiln fires to the correct cone (temperature), or lower or higher, I will be able to find out by seeing the cone pack when I unload the kiln. I usually use two cone packs per firing; one on the lowest shelf and one on the highest. This way, if one of the heating elements is out I'll know about where it is.

I also loaded my kiln with some new test tiles. From an earlier post I wrote about using a new red clay body. After the bisque firing I was able to paint test some of my old glazes on the new clay. This weekend I will fire the kiln and find out how they look.

After loading my tiles I had about half of the kiln space left over, so I decided to make more tiles with the new artifacts I found on my artist date from earlier in the month. I am so excited about these new textures! I will be able to make some new images with my mosaics. Last summer I had many organic textures from the plants by the woods by our house, but this past winter we've had several freezes and many of the plants have died. That has forced me to find other sources of texture, which is actually a good thing.

The Artist Date

I got to take myself on an artist date this past weekend! I am reading a second book by Julia Cameron called Walking in This World. Any of you who are creative would benefit from reading her books. Yes, they are in the "self-help" section of your book store. But who can't use a little help here and there? I have to say that these books have helped me tremendously with my creations.

Anyhow, back to the artist date... The Artist Date is when you take your creative self out to do something that you enjoy - such as see a play, or go to the park. I needed some new textures for my clay (which I always do) and went to this old antique shop that I last visited about 10 years ago. I love old things. Locks, irons, tables, whatever. For me, though, in order to keep such things, they must be functional. I can't have a bunch of nick-naks sitting around my house. To me, it's clutter.

I spent about an hour scanning shelves and found some really neat things. Some old chandelier parts, a thermometer, a piece of iron - not sure what it is, and a wooden box. All of which will make some great new textures. I look forward to using them for my next batch of tiles.

Pizza Stone

This week I'm making a pizza stone for my wonderful husband! He likes to make home made pizza for me every Friday night. Lucky Me! The last two commercial stones we bought have cracked in half after baking at high heat. I figured it is a pretty easy thing to make, and at the temperatures I fire at, the stones should withstand 500 Degrees just fine.

I start out wedging a large piece of clay - about 13 lbs. Then flatten into a disk and throw into a slab. I use my rolling pin to help keep it circular and flat. I roll out the piece using my height guides and keep it to about 1/2" high. I know the piece will shrink about 11% after firing and I make it as large as my kiln is wide, about 16". Once I am happy with the shape and size, I add feet to the stone. Then smooth out the clay so it looks nice. Any holes may breed bacteria... we don't want that! I then move it to a wood board to dry out a bit, then flip to check that it is level. Then let it dry completely before firing.

This is my first attempt at cookware. I hope it works out just fine. :)

Clay Valentines

This week I've made clay valentines for the kids in my playgroup. For this project I chose a low-fire, white clay that is mixed with paper fibers. When it fires, the paper burns out. This results in a strong clay that is lighter in weight than regular clay. I used paper clay because I wanted something lightweight and strong that is less likely to break when getting banged around by kids.


After rolling the clay to 1/4" high, I cut out heart patterns with cookie cutters. I then poked a hole in the top corner with a straw and wrote their names in the hearts with a wooden clay tool.
For this particular project I don't have a lot of time so I will glaze them as greenware and then fire them. Greenware is unbaked, dry clay. Normally I do a bisque fire - which is a greenware firing without glaze and at a higher temperature. The bisque firing is not really necessary, but I usually do it so that I can keep the bisqueware around until I need it, and then do a separate glaze firing. Greenware is very fragile and I don't like to leave it lying around the studio. I glazed the valentines in reds and pinks. They were a big hit at the playgroup.