final piece

This is my abstract piece that I created, well part of it. It originally was a spoon which had a wave coming up out of it at the end but it broke in three places while firing the first time. I still glazed all three pieces but for some reason they only glazed fired the wave part so I was not able to glue all the pieces together like I had planned to. I hand built the entire wave part and I am really proud of the foam part that builds up on the edge of the wave. 

My idea for this was that I wanted to keep it abstract but still useful, which was why I had it connected to a spoon. I used three different glazes, two being crystlex and one just being a normal gloss glaze. I was really proud of the piece and still am even though it broke. I think the wave looks awesome and I hope I will get to glue all the pieces together eventually.

This is a bowl I created inspired by nature. I wanted to make the piece very simple and magical. I started with the bowl as a base and then hand built the leaves and scored and slipped them on to the bowl. I then went in with a pen tool and added the veins of the leaves and also the swirls coming from the bottom of the leaves on to the bowl.

I glazed the bowl using pastel blue and purple. I did not want to do normal nature colors, I instead decided to kind of make it look like watercolors. I really like how the glazing turned out, I think it has very magical vibes which was exactly what I was going for.

This was a piece that did not turn out at all how I hoped it would. I wanted to create it so it would look like a section of honeycomb but instead it came out looking like a chunk of nacho cheese. I started with a hexagon mode and then added texture using a stamp on the clay once it was fitted nicely on the mold.

I glazed the piece with a crystilex called Sassy Orange I believe and it honestly came out way more orange than I was expecting it too considering the color orange was in the title. I really do not like this piece and honestly will probably be throwing it out in the near future.

This piece is actually my favorite piece I have created all year. I started out with a flat sheet of clay and then draped it over a bowl mold and let the clay sit for a bit. Once the clay was a little tougher, I went in and just started to rip at the sides of the bowl to created the rough, organic edges it has. Then once the piece was bone dry, I took some red and purple under glaze and used a dry brush with little glaze on it to great the design.

Once the piece was fired the first time, I simple went in with clear glaze to create a nice shiny finish over the entire piece. Again, I am really happy with how it all turned out, I think it is a nice minimalist piece of art and it really reflects me as a person. 

tray

This is a piece I created using a mold. I wanted to keep the concept simple and minimal. I was inspired by Winnie The Pooh for this piece, it is one of my favorite stories/movies. I started out by wedging a ball of clay and then flatting it out on the slab roller. I simply then placed it over the mold, cut it to shape and then taped the mold on the table a couple of times for the clay to sink in to the shape more. Then I took a sharp tool to carve the letters into the clay,

For glazing, I used a deep yellow to color the wording and then just simple dipped my piece into the big bucket of glaze for a shiny finish. I really like how this piece came out, I think it is really aesthetically satisfying. I achieved making a cute Winnie The Pooh piece and I am quite proud of that.

Masterpiece - Nymphéas

Claude Monet was a French impressionistic artist who is mostly famous for his "Water Lilies" series. In the last 30 years of Monet's life, he mainly focused on painting water landscapes which mostly consisted of water lilies. Monet actually created around 250 water lily oil paintings. These pieces we all inspired by his property, were he planted and gardened water lilies and created a peaceful sanctuary.

Balance is a really good principle that is in Monet's water lily paintings, he made sure to spread out the plants evenly, without making them seem to symmetrical and unnatural. Rhythm is a clear principle throughout his pieces, with the repetition of the water lilies that are present in each painting of the series. Unity could also be a principle because it creates a sense of harmony and wholeness that wouldn't be there if the water lilies were missing in the paintings.

In my interpretation of Monet's Water Lilies, I did not take inspiration from just one of his paintings, I look at a few of them and tried to combine them into something in between. I took main elements that flowed through each of the pieces, such as the water lilies and the mostly blue toned water surrounding them,

Something I would try to improve on would be to add more colors into the piece. Monet's paintings were all very colorful and have tons of color mixing and I stayed more with the same few glazes and just created more of a basic blue water scene when I wish I added more color and made it just all more interesting.

Texture Project/Donation

This is my textural project which I also ended up donating for the fundraiser. I first rolled out a slab of clay and the pressed in the textural design into the slab. I then used a mold I found to create the general shape of the plate with the textured slab. For glazing I did a purple underglaze and then tried to use an opalescent glaze over it but I didn't do it right I guess.

Rhythm would be principle because of the repeated design on the plate itself. Balance could be another principle because if you were to cut the piece in half, the sides would be the same, I made sure that that the rim of the plate was even all around. Proportion could also be principle because the plate is all even and uneven.

When I saw the patten of the stamp, it reminded me of scales, which is where I got the idea to try and glaze it to be oceanic colors with blues, greens, and purples. Then I decided to try out the opalescent glaze on top of the oceanic colors but I think I added too much because the whole thing just turned out the color of the opalescent.

I am not too proud of this piece. I think the glazing is what really ruined the piece for me. I also added too many layers of glaze that it took away some of the texture I pressed into the clay, making it not very textured which was the whole point of this piece.