Linoleum block I carved last year to use on clay

I haven’t spent much time in the studio lately…but I have been thinking about new projects related to clay and print making.  I feel like branching out partly inspired by the following two books:

Printing by Hand - Lena Corwin

I had picked up Lena Corwin’s book, Printing by Hand, from the library last year but felt it didn’t apply to my projects at the time.  Most of the examples and projects involve printing on paper, fabric, furniture and walls.  But, I have a hankering for printing some note cards and stationery and remembered her book.  I did some internet sleuthing (read googled the title of the book) and landed on Lena’s blog.  I don’t know how much time I spent perusing her blog, when eventually I saw mention of Lotta Jansdotter.

Lotta Prints by Lotta Jansdotter

I managed to find two of her books at the Denver Public Library – Lotta Prints & Lotta Jandsdotter’s Simple Sewing.  I’m inspired by both Lotta’s and Lena’s use of printmaking to make beautiful and decorative items.  I can’t wait to explore some of the resources they list in their books on the web this afternoon.

PhotoEZ Screen Print Starter Kit

I am particularly interested in screen printing which both Lotta and Lena describe in their books and am reminded that I still have the PhotoEZ Screen Print Kit that I haven’t used yet.  I should mess around with it before I leave on vacation next week.  One method of screen printing that I also want to try is using drawing fluid and screen filler to create easy original screen prints.

If you visit regularly, you might be asking yourself – “What about clay???” Wait for it…………wait for it…………okay….. I mentioned above that I want to branch out a bit.  I’m going to try my hand at making some paper products for sale along with some fabric/sewing projects for the new/old home we’re moving into in late August.  It will give me a chance to do some drawing and think that the projects will translate really nicely as color ceramic decals if I can get my act together.  The screens would also work nicely directly on raw clay using underglaze.

The paper & fabric projects will give me some instant gratification unlike making pottery (okay there is gratification in making and designing, but less so when the firings don’t always turn out as expected).  These projects will also be more portable when I consider that my studio is also going to be moving cross town – a task I am looking forward to.  Why?  Because my studio needs some serious reorganizing!  What better way to accomplish the task than a move to light the fire under my behind.

Signing off,

Cynthia

Shoe soles l-r Danskos, Tevas, Skechers

Please excuse my fun with homophones, but my students and I played around the other day in clay class with our shoes and some clay.  While packing up unsold pots after the Colorado Potters Guild Spring show last weekend, I stopped to talk with Penny Woolsey, who also teaches clay classes to kids.  I picked up one of her unsold pots which was a really cool plate with a textured rim, when she remarked, “Haven’t you ever made soul pots before with your students?”  Of course, she didn’t mean “soul”, but rather “sole”.  She explained the project to me and I thought, “Perfect!” – this is what we’ll make in the next class.

But, first, I had to try the project at home to make sure the kids could handle it.  I set off for my closet in search of cool soles and came up with 3 pairs of shoes that worked – Danskos, Tevas and Skechers – yep, I’m practical that way aiming for comfort over style.

After rolling out a slab and cutting the basic shape - use a shoe to print texture into the clay

I used all three shoes for a variety of textures and only printed on the rim of the plate.  Some of my students printed the entire slab with very cool results.  The kids had a great time comparing cool sole textures and mixing and matching.  I’m not sure anyone had ever looked at the bottom of their shoes before – I know I don’t normally make a practice out of it.

Using the "plate-o-matic" technique, I placed the slab on a piece of upholstery foam and used a wood block to press down in the center which causes the rim to pop up - presto magic instant plate

I saw this in a Pottery Making Illustrated article last year and really loved the technique.  The article is easily found but is a direct download – so if you’re interested here’s the pdf version: Plate-O-Matic.

Leatherhard sole plate

My plate is drying and I didn’t get any photos of the kid’s plates taken because I decided to go ahead and load the kiln yesterday.  I’m not firing till the weekend, but it’s another busy week and I’m trying to save time when and where I can.

Tomorrow, I head down town with my daughter’s class for the Denver Shakespeare Festival.  It’s a lot of fun, but also exhausting.  Most of the K-12 schools in Denver Public Schools are participating.  It’s fun to see everyone all dressed up in period costumes and at their thespian best.

It’s almost the weekend,

~Cynthia

Clay Roulettes

Several weeks ago, I participated in a stamp exchange with other members of the Etsy Mud Team.  Swaps are fun – you just never know what you’re going to get in return.  I was pretty happy with the ones I received, but didn’t know how the recipients of my stamps/roulettes had used the ones I sent.  Yesterday, the recipient of one of my roulettes, shared some photos of work she has made using a roulette (left one in photo above) I posted last month.  Lisa has really integrated the roulette into her work nicely – take a look at the photos below:

Platter using roulette for the rim - Photo courtesy of Lapella Pottery

Pen pillow - my personal favorite! Photo courtesy of Lapella Pottery

In my opinion, Lisa and her hubby, Alex, are Etsy success stories – they’re really selling a lot of pottery online.  So go on, check out their awesome hand built and wheel thrown work in their Etsy Shop.

But, let’s not stop here…what happens when a clay roulette is “super sized”?

Tire roulette

This site was brought to my attention by another fellow Etsy Mud Team Member – pretty dang cool, huh?

Meanwhile, I had hoped to do a ^04 decal firing this afternoon, but it just didn’t happen.  I’ll start the kiln early tomorrow morning – I’m going to bed as soon as the bread is done baking, hence the late (for me) night post.

~Cynthia

I ain't rolling no pie crust - excuse my poor grammar

We’re back home from our mini ski vacation and I am back in the studio in a last minute attempt to crank out work for the Colorado Potters Guild show opening April 30th.  I’m starting with the more labor intensive, but popular hand-built items like mugs and boxes and will follow up with wheel thrown work next week – this should allow me enough time to bisque and glaze fire everything in time for the opening.  Last fall, visitors were very sad that I didn’t bring more covered boxes.  I guess that’s a good thing.

Hand-building square bottomed mugs

I haven’t made any hand-built mugs in awhile, and decided to ease into production by making  two mugs yesterday afternoon.  I’m using lino-cuts that I fashioned in the shape of my paper templates to make these mugs.  I have some ideas for more lino-cuts to expand the line a bit, but I’m not sure that I’ll have time this go around.  That activity might have to wait till after the show.  I do have 4 lino-cuts though and several soft textures to work with – what do you think – should I make 4-6 of each?

I worked on two at a time to get back into the swing of things

One of the tricky things (for me) in regards to hand-building mugs is to get nice almost seamless interiors and a smooth rim.  I used a bit of plastic from a dry cleaning bag and some water to smooth the rim like I do when I throw in an attempt to compress and round the edges of the mugs so that they will be unobtrusive to the user.  I also weight the mugs down with some wood boards to keep them from warping while they dry.

Mugs are finished

Voilá, handles are attached and the mugs are ready to begin the drying process.  I used the exact same texture for the handles, just with different orientations – I’m not sure which one I like better.  There are infinite possibilities just using the same  template and textures depending on orientation for a mug or anything else for that matter.

View from the condo where we stayed in Steamboat

After an incredibly mild and fairly warm winter, Colorado has fortunately been graced with snow and lots of it these past 7 days which should help ease the impending summer drought fears just a little bit.  While we were in Steamboat Springs for vacation last week, we experienced snowy gray days for all but our last day.  Imagine our surprise when we woke up our final day and actually saw the view outside the condo we were staying at – gorgeous!  Up until then, we hadn’t been able to see much past the cabin in the foreground.  If you click on the enlarged photo,you can even get a peak of a hot air balloon in the distance that was making its way across the valley.  We had a great time and the snow was terrific for skiing, but alas, there’s no place like home.

I’ve been on the computer way too long this morning after waking to snow again – but the sky is blue which means that it’s time for me to head to the garagio for the day.

Glad to be back,

~Cynthia