A couple of strange ones that didn't work.

Don't really like either of these.  But still fun to make and they now live in the outer reaches of the garden on the farmlet.  Aspects of them I will use in future works. 

Pretty blue bowls.

I really like the low fire alkaline glazes.  These are over a range of white clay bodies. The firing temp was pushed to cone 3 (should have been 03). Interesting  pulling effects occurred.

Mouse man

Is it a mouse? Is it a dog?  I really am not sure.  But he is friendly, affectionate and loving.  He is also very loyal and non-judgemental.

Begging dog

This little chappy has sold at Kina. Dogs are such fun to make.  I have noticed that I have started talking to them at a certain point in the 'creation' process.  That is the moment of them coming to 'life' for me.  If they break after that, then I do feel a sense of loss.

New models?!

I am working on a series of bull dogs at the moment. Research on the internet turned up this picture! Just had to share.

Back at full time work...

I enjoyed working part time for the first half of this year.  Making labels for the garden, bottling the surplus fruit from the orchards, making art, developing the garden.... etc. I felt like a real woman/mother! It was such a change from being full on teaching.  I never really had time off with the kids when they were little. I was focussed on the teaching and career path. The last five years or so I have had a shift in thinking.  I am no longer career focussed. I don't think it has made my teaching any worse...it has just made me more balanced about what is important.  It was nice to be able to be fully 'there' for them the last 6 months...able to listen..not saying 'Hurry up' all the time. Being back full time teaching is pretty full on but it is nice to have my own class again. They are new entrants.  I love seeing how they change so much over the first few weeks at school. 

The new man in my life!

This is the new man in my life! He is an ex trotter and looks very scruffy at the moment with his winter coat on. His name is Waaka Knight. But for reasons unknown to me he was nicknamed Bud. He is a gentleman. He is 17.

This little pony

Well we moved to the farmlet...and did the 'old MacDonald' thing....chickens, goat, cattle, pukekos, tui, wood pidgeons, puppy etc etc.  Got Ella a pony.  He is called Taffy and is very strong willed. This little pony started another whole string of changes in my life.  New car...pony club...float...

But most of all he has made me face some things from my childhood that scare me.  I used to ride alot but due to events in my middle teens I got too scared to do stuff.  I became very self protective and self contained.  I decided to buy myself a horse too and face those fears.  Has it worked? Yes...but not cured.... I love him to bits but only spend a few minutes on him at a time before I panic. But I have decided that probably that is the point...take it easy, don't go too fast and just enjoy the moment (the ride) for what it is. Wow...time to stop being so deep and meaningful.

Rat's revenge!

Well, opening the kiln this time I got more than I bargained for! An explosion of legs arms and heads! Never happened before! 'Fright' the cat certainly got one and there wasn't much left of the rat (see front right of the picture above). I didn't know whether to laugh or cry! Certainly the irony of many late, frosty and wet nights in the studio to work on this firing was not lost on me. Think I will go with the laugh option. 

So now I am left pondering why?

Firing temp? Clay body (Keanes white Raku)? Joins?  It was two sculptural pieces on two different shelves that took out the others...the Rat and the cat.

A happy ending?

Not sure! But it has made me not have any expectations about the glaze firing this weekend. I have slapped on oxides and other chemical concoctions...dribbled glazes and I have no doubt now that when I open the kiln next week, it will be a complete surprise...just like Christmas used to be! 

More images from the next firing...

'Fright' and various candlestick holders in the Kiln waiting for the 'on' switch!

Another image from the kiln loading.

Loaded and ready to go!

'

Next firing in the kiln and ready to go. 'Fright' the cat at the top certainly looks worried. 'Happy dog' at the bottom looks excited!

A close up of 'happy dog',rat and candlestick cat.

POSTSCRIPT>>>Rat (bottom) and 'fright' (Top) blew up in the kiln.  Rest in peace

New Plymouth Potters Exhibition

Just finished this poster and and invite that will be posted for the Annual New Plymouth potters exhibition. They should be appearing around town about now!

The 'Bach' break

Recently, for a wee mid-winter break we took the kids and the dog to stay at this Bach about an hours drive from where we live.  It is very original and potentially 'romantic'. It has been in a friends family for many years and it really is like staying in a little time capsule.  It was her parents who have passed away.  I was wanting to get the teenagers away from electronica for a few days....no T.V....no cell phone..playing old fashioned family games like monopoly etc etc.  Get the idea?  ANYWAY....by Sunday afternoon both the older two children (what is the best 'term' for teenagers?) were ready to repeatedly bang their heads on the table with boredom. The 17 year old had been bitten on the face by a white tail spider and was very swollen and sore. It had rained a lot, we had all argued a lot and a number of family games had been played.  The dog was over being inside or tied up.  Both nights she had slept stretched out between Clyde and I in the bed like a third human. We had very little sleep due to her constantly licking our face. At home she is a farm dog and lives solely outside or in the laundry...so she was in heaven.  

What is the point of this post/reflection?  Hmmm.  I think it is that although it was a tough little break and we were all ready to tear each other apart by the time we got home .....it will be one of those experiences that we will all remember and will contribute to the shared memories and shaping of our family.  Often it not just the cheerful happy times that 'make' a family.  Those times that are challenging and difficult are just as powerful in contributing to the building of the family.

P.S  The white tail bite became infected.  She needed to go on antibiotics AND it was just before the school ball.  That is another story!

Vessels

More recent work around the idea of 'doodling' from old diaries and meeting notes.  I have made quite a number of these now. At home I use them for pens, paintbrushes and even in the bathroom for toothpaste and toothbrush holders.  I am really enjoying using black and white to decorate at the moment.  The negative and positive in image making has always been fascinating.

Blue wonky bowls..31,32,33

Three more wonky bowls...31, 32, and 33. I don't know why I didn't start numbering them earlier! It is such an easy way to categorize them.  This time I used a blue low fire alkaline glaze. (Greg Daly)  Although I pushed it to cone 3, they turned out nice.  Rough around the edges...but nice.  I do not like work that is too perfect.  I like it to look handmade.  The glaze pooled in the centre of the bowls. Melting glass/marbles as part of the glaze process is something I would like to try in the future.

Chalk Millie

In a recent studio clean up I found this chalk drawing of my daughter. When I was art teaching at Highlands Intermediate she would come to my classroom after school and take lots of pictures of herself in different poses looking into the computer using 'photo booth'. (This was five years ago). It used to make me feel really cross. This drawing is from one of the photo booth photos. Today she took delivery of her very own mac book for her to take to university next year. This drawing appeals to me... not only because she is my daughter and she is very cool...everything a Mum could want...BUT also because my favourite all time movie is 'Amelie'.  In this movie the main character is involved in a situation around photo booths in the french city she lives in.

I love the energy of working fast and furious in chalk.  It is dusty and rough around the edges.  I like to see the energy of 'mark making' in artworks.

I like how she looks sneaky and 'caught out'..but only I know why......until now!

Ash, volcanoes and earthquakes.

Well. It has all been happening lately! Eruptions, earthquakes in Christchurch and many other natural disasters around the world. This is the ash around our mountain from the Chilean eruption, over the last week. As we live on the mountain ranges to the right, it has made for interesting sunsets etc. Along with that the planes have been unable to fly over New Zealand due to the ash.  Hmm, natural disasters galore. Then we keep getting the Jehovah witness crowd turning up to the farm each month wanting to engage me in conversation about the coming 'rapture'.  I believe in being the best person I can be, religion or not.  I don't always get it right.  But I try and live by the motto 'harm none' and seek opportunity to contribute positively.  Does that mean I will not be taken 'on high' in the impending 'rapture' event...because I am not with an 'affiliated' religion?  My head hurts when I think about the state of the world at present, but even more so when I consider the philospical 'scaremongering' that is going on that makes it difficult for our children to grow up secure, focussed in the 'present' and being the best they can be. There is way too much doom and gloom around at the moment to make for a healthy society.

more wonky bowls..

The 'wonky bowl' project is up to thirty now. Seventy to go!  These ones are in the late teens.  The photos don't do the patterns justice. Nice to have the studio filling up with work.

Ruby

Man, I love this picture. I found it on the net a while back. The artist 'reworks'/'up-cycles' second hand clothes. I SO want to make a dress like this! I feel a project coming on! The artist was called Ruby...but that is all the detail I can remember.  I remember looking at her site and being awestruck with the exciting clothing.  However I misplaced the details about how to get to the site.  Will have to do some sleuthing and track her down !

Doodling patterns.

I have been continuing the theme of using old 'doodling' patterns from diaries and sketchbooks to decorate my clay work.  Not alot to say about it.  Just a bit of whimsy.  The candlestick has been in use for about a month now and is working really well.  I would like to try making one of those Jewish candelabra things with the seven candles...or may be it is five they have? I will have to do some research around candelabras on the internet. 

Woolly sheep.

I am sitting on the couch reflecting on the wild night outside.  Lightening and crashing thunder overhead.  The whole works! Bit worried about the horses out in this. Went to the studio tonight and the heat gun blew up! It must have sensed the coming storm and that I am stressed about going back to work full time for 6 months and therefore have the 'impending dooms'!  In this damp and rain it is hard to get work to dry....will have to get another one when I am in town next week.

This sheep has just sold at KINA.  I did this piece at a weekend course last year with potter Fiona Tunnicliffe. I was so impressed by how she would stamp and then rip the clay into strips...and also build her works from the bottom up.  Usually I build from the head down.  Much more stability is gained from starting at the bottom and working up.  Also I loved how she used a butane torch to dry and strengthen the clay as she worked.  The flame was very exciting and effective, but too much for me.  I have stuck to my heat gun but admire her methods.

Initially I did not like this sheep.  It is very different to other works I have done.  However after glazing I have decided I like the contrast between the oxides and the Abbots white glaze.  Also I like how the Abbots clear went a bit green, I presume due to the oxides.  I also like how the teeth worked out in the sheep.  Funny wee creatures. 

The big black dog.

The kiln firing has been done! I was very pleased with how all the critters came out.  After much discussion with fellow potters, I fired to cone 3 and it worked well with the underglazes and the abbotts clear.  I even tossed in some low fire alkaline glazed pieces and they did okay too.  Big thanks to Suzanne, Cecily and Barbara for all their advice.  I am still having trouble with finding a good intense red but think I may have that resolved for the next firing.

This is a big black dog.  The markings came from my big black dog on our farmlet.  She is called Jess. I am doing a lot of dogs at the moment. Winston Churchill used to refer to the 'black dog' of depression that chased him.  The idea for the current series came from his words.  I have been having a few issues with 'feeling down'/'blue' lately. I tend to call it the 'creative curse'.  I believe all creative types have the depressive streak to their personality.

The dogs are my response to this.  

This dog sold with in a few days of being in a local art and design store (called KINA). I was sorry to see him go but also excited as he is the first pottery work I have sold.  He represents a shift for me from being a painter to a potter. With pottery I feel like I have 'come home'...it feels natural.

Twisted toys...etc....

Oh my lordy, there has been a lack of blogging lately!  It is not because I haven't been creating. I have ALOT.  So much so, that getting time to update the blog has been tricky....the creating has been varied......  clay, home, farm (buying horses, cars and floats), finishing the studio, painting, making business cards, setting up classrooms (I am going back to work full time for 6 months)......DO YOU GET THE IDEA?  Here I am trying to simplify things and this place is making our lives even crazier!

I have a love/hate relationship with the farmlet.  It is very time consuming developing this place and being up on the side of a mountain range does make for a lot of rain and dampness and mud.  Tonight I was feeding the horses and dealing with the mud from the rolling frenzy they had engaged in during the two hours without covers on...but the worse bit was dealing with the mud trying to suck me in (and underground) via my gumboots.  It truely had me in a hold and was not going to give up!

But back to the picture above.  I like to get toys from the hospice that were previously loved... and add to them.  I add bits and cut bits off...paint new bits (like faces) and add them on.  Last year victim support complained about what I was doing.  This bothered me as I feel that it is not harming the toy...just helping them be 'loved' again. 

HOWEVER, this has raised issues in my mind about do we have to be fresh and  'new' to be loved/desired/wanted? Does being older and a bit craggy around the edges make us less desirable.

Hey...I suspect this is too big a discussion, for this forum, here and now!

P.S- The dog has taken a fancy to 'snatching' these toys from the studio and tearing them to shreds when I am not looking.  Holy hell! What is that about!?

More work waiting to go in the kiln

It is piling up around the place waiting for firing in the next 6 weeks or so!  This will all come out shiny and pretty.  For an idea compare the spiny paper weight that has been fired and glazed in the top image with the unfired and glazed one in the bottom image.  The other day the wind got all the 'post -it- notes' and scattered them to the four corners of the shed! It really was a nightmare trying to match up all the notes with the work.  Hope I got it right or I could have a few disasters in the kiln!

When your number is up.....

Lately I have been pondering the purpose of it all.  With so much uncertainty in the world at present (Christchurch and Japan earthquakes...Libya etc etc) and the fact we live on the side of a volcano it makes sense at this time to reflect on life. This wonky bowl will fire black and white.  It has numbers scratched in the under glaze. It will have a scraffito effect when fired. On the legs I have used old school rubber stamps of the numbers to 100.... the ones we used before photocopiers... and got ink all over our fingers when we stamped the grid in the maths books. (now my age is showing!)  The numbers on the legs are not clear in the photo but will fire well I think.

When will my number be up?  Who knows but I am guessing I just have to get on with life and enjoy it.

Hey! I also think there is something sort of wacky about how the bowl will be fired with flame in a gas kiln and that we live on a volcano........

A few more wonky bowls.

A few more bowls in various stages of creation. The under glaze is never true to colour till it is fired.. so it will change dramatically.

The top bowls will be left- lime green, cornflower blue legs with black spots. right-black body with white inside and white legs.

The bottom bowls will be dipped in bright cobalt blue, low fire Alkaline glaze.

Twenty wonky bowls done.  Eighty to go!

The painting corner.

Lining the studio continues.  Soon we will paint the walls all white and polish the concrete floors.  It has come along way from the farm shed.  We (My husband and his Dad...awesome men) have taken out roller doors, put in new windows, lighting, gardens etc. It has become a light and airy place to work.  I have set up camp in one corner to start painting again.  The shed is bigger than the house.  An elephant would have room to rattle around inside it!  There is the pottery studio part and the print making part and the sewing part and the printing part.  I have even parked up the caravan inside to work on over winter AND still have stacks of room!  How lucky am I?  Now I just need to create!  HOWEVER  the farmlet is in 'do up' phase... so there is always something to do urgently here.

Baby, light my fire!

Sshhhh!  It's a secret!  This is my new kiln and I am scared of it.  It is gas.  I am living in fear and excitement about the first firing.  Luckily I have a very skilled potter and friend down the road who will help me start the critter up for the first time.  Thank goodness for Suzanne. It is very definitely not a programme and walk away job!  But that is exciting....?

The girl in the hat.

Another little dry point print.  I have been combining media lately and especially enjoying sewing over drawings and prints.

Kina and other dead and decaying stuff.

Lately there have been bucket loads of Kina on the beach....The studio has become quite 'ripe' with smell of them and the crabs legs I have been bringing home from the beach. (The seagulls get the bodies).  My oldest daughter asked me why I have this thing about bringing home beach debris/dead stuff.  Good question as I am always one for self-reflection and navel gazing! (Too much so).  But I really don't know the answer to that one. So I will just continue to bring them home.  The patterns in Kina are so satisfying.

waiting...waiting

Well...the new kiln is in and ready to go....just need to get the gas regulator.  These little chaps have been waiting a while to reach the end of their creation process.  They will fire black and white with strong reds and browns. The process of firing and glazing never ceases to amaze me.  I love how you can 'under glaze' (like is on these guys) and the colours change so much in the firing process.

wonky bowls..life isn't perfect and neither are we!

Still working on the '100 wonky bowls'.  (Could be for a while actually). This one was a very sandy clay and blue and white glaze.  Initially I didn't like the way the glaze pulled out from the clay body during firing to expose the clay.  But now I like it.

Kaitake ranges-Davies track

This is the view from the hill behind our house.  Actually it is an old volcano that last erupted 500,000 years ago.  In the holidays the girls and I climbed the track that leaves at our gate and goes to the Trig station at the top.  It was a way harder walk than I expected but we had a great time.  Fully recommend it! Our farmlet is at the bottom of the ridge and from our place it drops steeply down to the sea.  The bush on the way up was fantastic...all vines...like something from a Harry Potter movie.  Great place for some future sketching.

Doodle bowls

To teach myself to be a better potter, I am making 100 wonky bowls.  They are decorated in different ways and it is giving me the chance to experiment with decoration techniques and clay bodies whilst keeping the form essentially the same.  The idea from these came from two places.  The Asian restaurant in town called the 'noodle bowl'.  I liked the sound of it...and from some doodle drawings I made once during a staff meeting.......I plan to go back to a few old diaries and school planning books and hunt out other doodles.  I like the unplanned, unconscious sprawling nature of them. I wonder if out there in the world is someone who has a job working with analysing peoples doodle drawings!