Cups, Basket, and Bowl...

As I get the last bits of my new pieces ready for my upcoming show at Boxheart Gallery, I thought why not start shooting images of them and examine them further. When my new stuff starts sitting around my house in sort of a limbo, it detracts from my process in creating the work. I want to see the new work in the context that I made it for ...first. Then, I can live with the work around the house, or better yet, somebody else can live with the work around their home.

This is a set of 10 tumblers... not just mere cups! ha!...I had to really control myself to only post these 4 images...these are a 10 part multiple variable image that you and 9 of your friends can drink from. I have often wondered if I really am a painter trapped in a ceramist's body. It is sometimes more important for me to create an image rather than a form...these are an example. I worked long and hard on each, firing them all 3 times plus the bisque to complete a layered composition that floats and squiggles around each cup. I am pleased with the outcome as each has the motion that I was after as well as a sketchbook like quality to the surfaces. You can set these up in umpteen different ways and they still work...one line hopping from one cup to the other just to finish in a tangle behind the large floral decals. Gold lustre popping here and there...oh yeah...click on these to see bigger!

This next piece I am calling 'Red Poppy Basket'. She is 9 inches tall and like the tumblers, has been fired multiple times. I sprayed a chartreuse glaze lightly over my re-worked marshmallow glaze and fired it to cone five then fired my new decal images of squiggly lines, coffee rings and fragmented patterns to 04. The last firing was the commercial decals with all their rich color and gold bling to cone 018. I really like the chartreuse in the background...adds a little more depth.

Here is the other side and a shot of the mouth and inside...the interior is a bright waxy orange. It is sort of as if Las Vegas exploded in the year 1972 and the residuals drifted all the way to Japan... and I captured it all on a velvet painting framed in barn board. OK, if that makes sense to you...please talk to me! But, anyways, I am very happy with this piece...the imagery and vibrant colors work for me.

The last one for this post is 'Into the Sun' a 12" wide, low bowl. Fired like the others with the exception of the gold lustre brush work in place of the commercial decals. This is another piece that is about the imagery and the composition that includes the glaze as a vital part.

The birdies seem to come from a great distance deep within the robins' egg blue glaze of the bowl's interior. They wrap over the opposite lip and down the other side...I really liked using the gold lustre, for a person who works mainly from collage methods when putting together something 2-d, it felt good to get back to brush work. Hope you like my new pieces...

I will post again soon ...busy times ahead...show opens April 29, firing the wood kiln on the 30th, and then teaching at Touchstone Center for Crafts May 2-4...Graphic Ceramic baby, come get your decal on!