Turtle Whistle Glazed and Mold Making
Before leaving for our camping trip, my daughter’s and my clay whistle survived the kiln firing. It whistles even better now that it’s been glazed. This project showed me how far the reach of the internet is after a gentleman from Thailand emailed me wondering how he and his son could make a whistle of their own. He relayed that his son was autistic and loved using clay to make animals and such. I think they were going to try to make a dinosaur whistle. I asked him to email a photograph of their finished piece so that I can share their masterpiece on my blog.
In another fortunate turn of events, I snapped this bowl in half while dipping the bisqued piece in glaze. There’s a delicate balance between holding the piece to be glazed firmly with the dipping tongs, yet not with such an iron grip that damage is done to the bisque ware. Being the amazon that I am, I used my brute strength to break this bowl. While initially irritated with my inattentiveness, I marveled at the cross section of my bowl. I’ve been working on my throwing skills in an effort to achieve even thin walls in my thrown work. After seeing this bowl, I think I’m getting there.
In an effort to save time and to be able to produce a small production line, I’ve decided to learn about mold making. I picked up this book from the library this past week on how to make my own custom ceramic molds. It entails making an original and then casting the piece in pottery plaster so that multiples of the form can be made by either press molding or slip casting.
There’s a certain romance in throwing every single piece on the potter’s wheel, and I initially turned my nose down at the casting process. The form can speak for itself, but more and more I’m beginning to think that the form is a blank vessel for how the artist choses to finish the piece, much like a painter looks at a canvas before beginning to paint.
Frankly, I think that is where my attention is going to turn – to finishing and decoration. It’s already begun to a certain extent with my exploration of image transfer on clay. Today, I’m going to take a little trip to Kozo Fine Art Materials in Denver to pick up some print making medium to mix with underglaze so that I can start screen printing on both greenware and bisque ware. Also, I still need to order overglaze colors to make some custom decals.
Meanwhile, I normally try to post every other day, but have been side-lined with household projects since we returned from vacation. I think I mentioned that our home is going to be on the West Wash Park Home Tour on September 8th and we’ve been busy painting, re-upholstering furniture, landscaping and general spruce up of our home. Nothing like having hundreds of strangers walking through one’s home to light a fire under our behinds. The good news is that once the home tour has passed, our house is going to be in tip top shape and we’ll be able to sit back and enjoy the fruits of our labor.
Finally, Highwater Clay in Asheville, NC asked me to pass this onto any fellow ceramic artists out there: Lindsay Pichaske is presenting a workshop, “Living Forms, Narrative Pieces†every Monday starting August 20th through October 6th. Obviously, this might be a challenge for out of state folks, but would be perfect for NC residents!
& Lazy Summer Days">Clay Whistle & Lazy Summer Days
It’s the lazy days of summer and right about now, I’m hearing a lot of “Mom, I’m booorrredddd!” What to do? My clay production has slowed down considerably, perhaps due to the heat – though I feel perfectly acclimated now. I only notice it’s hot outside when I happen to pop into an air conditioned store where it’s icy cold. Or maybe production has slowed down because I’m trying to come up with activities to keep my 9 year old from spending too much time in front of the computer screen and TV.
We’ve been trying to go on a lot of field trips including the Titanic exhibit at the Denver Museum of Science and Nature – which was fascinating. We’re going to follow that exhibition up with a trip to the “unsinkable” Molly Brown House right here in Denver. We’re also planning the great American vacation that will most likely rival one of Griswold’s. Yep, we’re going to go camping and will visit Mount Rushmore in a week or so!
Meanwhile, my daughter and I pulled out Ceramics for Kids by Mary Ellis and made our first ever clay whistle. It was a collaborative effort. Originally, we both attempted to make one but we could only get one to whistle, so the other ended up in my scrap bucket. I made the body and my daughter decorated the whistle into a turtle. It’s currently in the bisque kiln, along with my effigy doll head, feet and hands.
If you would like to see how to make your own whistle, visit Chris Henley or Dwight Bartholomew who have some wonderful tutorials available on their websites.
To step it up a bit, visit Kenji Ogawa who makes beautiful ocarinas, or clay flutes. He has also mastered the art of playing the ocarina and even has an mp3 available on his site if you’d like to hear beautiful music being played with an ocarina.
Have a good week everyone,
