Lichen and Dragonflies

I just finished this painting.  The second in what may be a series of acrylic, myco, and glitter paintings.  The green objects are Cladonia Chlorophaea (lichen) from Scotland and the dragonfly is a darner.

My pendants inspired the painting.  I have several more in progress.  I’m not sure where the work is going, but I’m having fun on the journey.

More to come soon!!!

Studio News

 

For the last 12 hours of studio time I’ve been working at forming new clay pieces to become future pendants.  It’s more time consuming than I thought.  I’m making many more than I did in my first batch.  I roll out the clay, let it sit and dry for hours, cut out shapes, smooth and form them with my fingers, then set them to dry again.  When they are completely dry I’ll lightly sand them so I have a smooth side to draw on, and so they feel good against the skin.  Then they will be ready for the kiln.  It’s not the most exciting work; I like doing the drawing better.  But, I’m excited to have at least 130 tiny canvases.  

 

New Necklaces

During my recent block of studio time I got to work on those clay pieces I blogged about a month or so ago. 

I glued bails (the looped hangers) to the backs of the ceramic drawings with epoxy that is strong enough to suspend an elephant from a chandelier.  I threaded the bail with a silken cord and created my own sterling silver wire wrapped clasp.  I was so worried that the wire wouldn’t hold the cord firmly, but it does!  I can tug on the cord with all my strength and it doesn’t budge.  I completed 14 necklaces and then ran out of wire.  Doh!  This week I’ll order more.  

I’m really happy with how these are turning out and plan to start molding more clay shapes this week for future pendants.  At some point, they will be available in my Etsy shop.  I'll let you know!

 

Clay Update

I got my myco-ceramic-mini-drawing-pendants out of the kiln today.  Most of them look pretty good, a few, not so much.  The under-glaze pencil got lighter in the kiln, and they smeared a tad.  I’ll have to take that into account next time.  Overall I think they are really cool.  I’m planning to put them on a simple black cord with a clasp and post them in my Etsy shop.  It will be a while though.  The muse is keeping me busy!

You Win Some, You Loose Some

The Keepers

A while back I was playing around with making clay pendants.  I bisque fired everything and they came out great!  Then I ordered some special glazes and fired them again a few days ago.  (I didn’t glaze everything).  Some of my creations came out beautifully others were a disaster.  Without going into detail, some of the pieces ended up touching each other in the kiln.  Ooops!  I had them on a bead tree (kiln furniture) on a thin wire, the wire bent and they touched things they weren’t supposed to touch. Also, I may have overloaded my bead tree because I couldn’t wait for another firing.  At least I know what my glazes look like.

What you see in my photos will not end up on my Etsy shop; I’m just playing around, trying to get to know the medium.  Tomorrow I plan to break out the clay again for round 2!  I can’t wait!

The Losers

Play with Clay

Clay pendants waiting to be fired in a kiln.

 

I’ve been getting into playing with clay the past couple days.  Just experimenting.  Mostly I’ve been rolling a thin slab and stamping designs.  There are so many things to try.  My technique is getting better.  It appears that waiting is the hardest part.  That is, waiting for the clay to dry a bit before I can work with it.

I’ve been walking around the past couple days feeling completely unproductive, until I took this picture.  It doesn’t look unproductive!  For some reason, a lot is never enough with me.  Every moment in my life not spent doing something creative is wasted time.  I know this is technically not true, but it feels that way.  I sense a new years resolution somewhere in that statement. 

Okay, back to work!

The Learning Curve

First attempts

Lately I’ve been thinking about working in clay.  I’d like to experiment with making beads, pendants, plates, bowls, and more.  It’s been a long time since I’ve done ceramic work!  So, I bought a 25-pound bag of white clay and excitedly dug in. 

Oh dear!  It was not as easy as I imagined while lying in bed at 3 am. The clay was mushy and hard to work with.  It stuck to my fingers, cutters and molds. In fact, the “ugly” voice reared its head and repeated, “I hate clay, I hate clay”. I told it to shut up and stepped away for several hours for a trip to the movies and the mall.  I finally returned to the worktable after dinner to a brilliant surprise.  The clay had hardened some and I was able to execute a reasonable amount of control! 

Now, I have renewed faith and will take a stab at it again tomorrow.  If I had given up when it got frustrating, I would have missed out on a fantastic opportunity.  I’m always telling my students to stick with their projects and not give up.  Sometimes a time out is the best medicine.