The Homeless Finch Leaves For Paris

We leave today for 12 glorious days in Paris, France.  It will be my kids first time over the pond and I am so excited to show them everything.  We will be staying in one place the entire time, taking a few day trips out of the city.  My doggies are sad, but we have someone staying at the house full time while we are gone.  Yep.  I know.  They are spoiled.  Whatcha gonna do??

Many of you know that I have pondered what to do with The Homeless Finch while I am gone.  I have noticed that people who blog often have friends guest blog during absences.  I haven't been blogging long enough to make something like that happen.  So, I have made the decision to suspend The Homeless Finch until my return.  Hope you guys are okay with that.  Will you be here when I return?  I hope so...... 

Until then, Au revoir!

My Collection of Wood Fired Pottery

Source:
http://travel67.wordpress.com/

Since packing and preparing for my summer vacation is taking up most of my days, my Homeless Finch projects have been put on the back burner.  As I explained earlier in the week, I wanted to share with you a few of my collections. On Wednesday, I highlighted my collection of finch.  Today, I want to share with you my collection of wood fired pottery. 

Photo Source: Bradford Pottery.



In my blog post yesterday, I spoke about the years I spent with my hands in clay.  During those years, I had several opportunities to wood fire my work.  There are countless ways to fire clay.  I have experienced many of them.  But nothing compares to the magic that happens inside a kiln during a wood firing.  Other than a thermocouple, there is very little modern technology involved.  The firing is done similar to the way ancient man fired pottery.  Consequently, the man hours involved is extensive.  It takes a group effort, working together loading, lighting, monitoring, adding more fuel (wood), stoking the fire and keeping watch overnight as the fire roars. As hard as this sounds, a group firing can be delightful because it brings together other artists in a camp like atmosphere....and yes a few coolers filled with libations. (wink)


There is also a magic that occurs during a wood fire....something that cannot be controlled.  As the ash from the wood blows through the hot kiln, it will attach itself to part of the pottery and creating designs on the surface that cannot be duplicated.  It is because of this experience that I have a serious love for wood fired pieces. I started collecting them several years back one piece at a time.  Here are some of the most special.....


A sample collection sitting on my living room coffee table



A piece that I made a few years back.
It was thrown in pieces, altered and constructed.



A little vase by
Brian Somerville.



Another small piece by
Brian Somerville



Large vase by
Brian Somerville

Of the proceeding pieces from Brian Somerville, two were a birthday gifts from my sister.  She knew that I loved his work and surprised me.  If you remember Brian is the instructor who introduced me to clay.  The first small vase was something he threw in class and stood and carved intuitively as he talked with us.  Nice memory.

The large vase is a great example of how ash from the wood enters the kiln and attaches itself to the ware forming a glaze like coating.  Notice how the left side is blank and didn't get any ash.  Call me crazy, but this vase reminds me how the sun only shines on one side of the earth at a time.  I bought this at a sale at school that is set up each year so students can sell their work.  I don't think Brian liked this vase. But I did.  Brian's current sculptural work is amazing.  If you want to take a peek at his website it's http://www.claybeast.com/.


Little creamer was thrown and altered
by Me.

 I love this little creamer. (above) Not because it was anything close to the best of my work, but because it was made during a time of great exploration for me.  After throwing the piece on the wheel, I took it off and altered it's appearance and added the handle.  I did this without thinking about any critique of the piece.  It was for me and no one else. It was also my first wood fired piece.   During the final critique that semester, it was pulled out and highlighted as noteworthy.  It reminds me how important it is to keep my work mine. 

A Jack Troy Nautilus Cup

The above Nautilus Cup is from an artist who lives in Pennsylvania named Jack Troy.  I picked up this cup when I was at NCECA (annual clay conference) in Pittsburgh a few years back. I paid a pretty penny for this little cup.  A woman made a comment to me in the purchase line that indicated to me that he was some sort of legend or something.   I have never met Jack, but I sure do love his pottery.
  

"Curly" a tiny pitcher by
Karla Walter

"Curly" Cup by
Karla Walter

The two "Curly" pieces above are by my good friend, Karla Walter.  Karla and I went through the same program in college, only she graduated a year ahead of me.  I always loved her student work and I am glad that a little thing called Facebook has kept us in contact with each other.  She played an integral part in helping me sell my clay studio equipment.  To view her Etsy Shop click here.   

I hope you enjoyed seeing a sneak peek at some of the wood fired pottery in my collection.  I just love the earthy feeling and look. I also love the idea that they were fired by a community of artists working together to create something special. 

-The End-

Thoughts On A Path Traveled Where Nothing Is Lost

Student Work in Ceramics Handbuilding

Many of you know that I returned to college when I turned 40 and earned second undergraduate degree, a BFA In Studio Arts.  I wrote about it in my first blog post that I re-posted this week.  What only a few of you know is that as a part of that degree I had a concentration in the area of Ceramics.  I didn't enter school thinking, "Wow, I think I will concentrate on a Ceramics degree."  I entered thinking, "I am going to get the art degree that I wanted to get 20 years ago.  I'm a painter."

Student work in Ceramics.

After a full year in the BFA program, I met a young ceramic artist who was working toward an MFA and was student teaching a sculpture class, Brian Somerville.  I enjoyed the class so much, that I decided to take Brian's Ceramics Handbuilding class the next semester.  Handbuilding is sculpture using clay as the medium.  Well....the clay got the best of me and I never left the department.  Don't get me wrong, I took all the other courses too....painting, printmaking, sculpture and others. But, my concentration was in Ceramics.  (I think that name of that degree needs to be changed because it conjures up the idea of a little 'paint your own pottery shop,' not the intense, time consuming and almost always frustrating art of making with clay.)



First home studio space.


I set up a studio in my home, complete with all the expensive equipment that a clay studio needs, then some.  I had three kilns, a wheel, a slab roller, several hundred pound of clay including porcelain, stoneware and terracotta.  I had the skills that I needed to make a go of it.  I worked in this studio for over a year, crafting piece after piece, firing them in my kilns and living under some of the most frustrating times of my life!

Glad I got an image.  This one blew up in the kiln.



You see, ceramics isn't easy.  It's time consuming and inherently has a ton of risk involved.  You can take weeks building a sculpture only to lose it in a kiln to some sort of unforeseen glitch in the firing cycle. A professor (not Brian) whom had been my primary instructor had done a number on my psyche and I couldn't seem to shake her from my studio work either.  (Just typing this still gives me anxiety!)   

I held onto the equipment for several years, starting and stopping.....starting and stopping. I thought that maybe my life was getting in the way of my art, until I realized that the clay was getting in front of my art!  Did that make sense?  

I realized that somewhere along the way, my fascination with clay that was sparked several years prior was a path that, although was wonderful while it lasted, was not the path that I needed to be continuing to walk down.  I decided to make a mass exodus, selling all my equipment and re-organizing my studio space.  I spent the next several months redeveloping my work, painting more and freeing up my mind for another endeavor. 

a painting in progress

I am still on that new path, wondering where it will take me.  My studio today has a painting in progress on the wall, a work table in the middle, Josh Groban singing Illuminations on the boom box, my doggies sitting by my side with my birdies chirping in the background.  I am writing my blog post, something that I have come to enjoy.  For the first time since graduating, everything about my progress as an artist feels right.  No longer does my former instructors criticisms haunt me.  No longer do I carry the guilt of spending years working in clay, only to come out the other end with little to show.  You see....every experience informs the next.  Nothing is lost.  It's the journey that matters...... 

(Brian Somerville has an amazing collection of work.  You can visit his web site at http://www.claybeast.com/.)

-The End-