Stray Cat Strut

The creative process is a process of surrender, not control.
Julia Cameron 

Process indeed. I have been in the middle of "my creative process" for some months now. 

I have been floundering in the chaos of big life transitions...job change, location change, studio change...and needless to say, its been difficult to focus and finish work. Mix those last three ingredients in with a host of other "bumps in the road" that I touched on in this past post and you will get quite a murky and unpleasant stew. But I am here to tell you that maybe 2013 may not be my unlucky year, that things are still in transition, but also that things may just be looking up.

So transition...yes, its still very much a part of my life ...and I was never that great with transition. I am learning to roll with it better and like the quote above I am also learning to surrender to it more. Not giving up by any means, just digesting and then continuing to move onward. The biggest and best change I want to share is that of my very new studio move. As of last week, I have shifted studios...again. I used to joke when I was at Little Mahoning Creek Pottery that I was the "squatter potter"...now I am more like the hobo potter traveling with my new kiln, slab roller, clay and tools all rolled up in a slip covered old towel tied to the end of a stick. But I also think that this is "it" and this is where I will hang my apron for a while.

view from the back to front...

Renee Suhr is the owner and visionary of this studio. She is a great ally for our beat up old mill town and has been actively working to bring about something positive. I met Renee a year or so ago here in Beaver Falls. She wanted to partner up and open a ceramics studio but I was unable to financially be a true business partner. She soldiered on and acquired a great space and persevered the permit police and extended delays over and over to finally be able to open...Stray Cat Studio ... here in the greater metropolitan area of Beaver Falls, Pa. We will be offering classes for hand building and wheel throwing, co-op studio space for the more advanced, and a retail gallery space by the fall.

check out that giant stainless sink!

a view from the front to back kiln area...wheels on the right

This whirlwind studio move for me came about a couple weeks back when she and I met for coffee. After some high-test java and half a blueberry muffin, I was going to be teaching classes there, giving private lessons and making my own work from there. WOOHOO! The following Monday Renee helped me move my new kiln and other stuff to Stray Cat Studio...by last Thursday I had mopped out the old space and returned the key. And as of the last few days, I have been glazing all my bisque ware in hopes of a glaze firing in the very near future. 

12x12 slab wall hangings...carved, bisqued and underglazed.

large platter made to be hung...carved, bisqued and underglazed

I posted about this idea and place...as well as some pics of the outside of the studio space...way back in July of last summer...here is the link. I am excited about all the possibilities with the studio, thrilled to be part of a growing community, and thankful that Renee is happy to have me. I have been enjoying myself while getting my glaze on and am eager to have some finished work. While putting this post together I also found a great comment a friend made on that same post that I just linked to...she said "embrace frustration to affect positive change"  this was a quote from a commencement speech at Stanford by Cory Booker. Thanks Jade...perfect for me these days! Finally I want to leave you with some pics that give you an idea of the size and niceness factor of this studio space. Also check out the website...straycatarts.wix.com/arts and of course search Stray Cat Studio out on facebook for news, pics, and random facebook like stuff! I'm off to do more glazing...stay tuned!

...and there is a whole other side!

A Quickie

Spring is just around the corner here in western PA...or at least I am being fooled into feeling that way during this weekend. Both yesterday and today will be right around 60 degrees WITH sunshine!!! We haven't seen that kind of weather in a while...however I think we are back into some snow by the end of the week. Its been a long winter. I am officially done with it.
I have been firing glaze tests...decal tests...making sure the new mid range glazes all look good when you fire them back to 04 for a decal. I can't help but pop a few other decal possibilities in the kiln when I do this. Possibilities being random china and vintage local pottery that I have laying around...and maybe even a left over salt fired mug that escaped me during this past Fall season...the man in the moon mug is that one(pictured above and below). A couple of the other local china piece got glaze blisters all over...oh well scratch those but thanks to my geographic location there is plenty of old china to decal and fire away.

Check out  this one(below) I did for my friends over at my local coffee shop, it is beautiful Japanese bone china I picked up at a place going out of business...I thought they might like it and it gives me an opportunity to just try out some new images. I like this part...you know, not actually getting all dirty, very little clean up... just sourcing out plain old restaurant ware and putting a little of me on it...spruces it up some!

Big news and new pots down the road...

Sick Days

This new year has been kicking me in the head since week one. No finished work to show right now...I am recovering from a wicked sickness that had me in bed with a high fever for almost five days straight. I picked this gem of an illness up from my daughter and now we have successfully spread it to my wife as well. Share and share alike...misery loves company...blah,blah,blah... I am a bit wiped out still but I have been able to fire off a couple bisque loads. The glaze tests start tomorrow...next post I will have pieces that should be close to finished so that I can do a little show and tell.

In the mean time, once again, check out this new basket form I have been playing with ... then scroll over to the music video on my side bar and throw your hands up in the air and have your own little dance party...its hard not to...

...like the ceiling can't hold us.

Process and Progress

Or progress and process...take your pick...I'm up to my elbows in both. I thought I would post some pictures of that today, you know...process and progress.

I would be posting some glaze tests with a couple new colors and maybe how they look with decals on my nice brown clay body BUT I am waiting not so patiently anymore for my very nice handy man to install my vent for the kiln. He has been saying he would install it for the past couple of weeks now...you know, another job pops up, he gets sick, the truck breaks down...um, yeah...got it. But right now I have a couple kiln loads ready to rock and I am feeling like I am a bit behind. I need to get somebody else's behind in gear.

Anyways, lets look at some of that there progress. The image above is a slab built wall piece. I have been making a bunch of these...they are roughly a foot or so and softly square-ish. Imagine a bunch of flamingo necks all poking up here and there...a small flock of flamingos all gabbing about what kind of Chinese food they like best while basking under the expansive skies. That's where my head is with these...just you wait. I also felt like making some nice vertical pieces too since I have been making so many of those slabs and wall platters lately. Check out these vases.

 I made these four and they are all between 14 and 18 inches tall. They are great for flowers since the neck is narrow and there is a slight splaying out at the lip. I think I might make a couple more of these with another variation in the top section. I have decided to slip and carve two and simply stick to just glazing the other two.

Here is that last one with its freshly carved lower section. Hopefully Monday I will be loading a bisque and I can get some pieces near complete...homey just wants to slap some graphics on those clouds!!! Keep your fingers crossed!

Head in the clouds...

Lets just start off this Monday morning with a congratulations to Super Bowl champs the Baltimore Ravens...UGHHH, BOOOOOOO, hisssssssssssss. Here in the Steel City(Pittsburgh,PA to you clueless folks) it was hard to root for either team. Honestly, I hate the Ravens and was not wanting to see that thug Ray Lewis retire on the tip top of the pile but I also did not want San Francisco to have as many Super Bowl rings as my team the Steelers either. But what are ya gonna do...my hate for the Ravens won out and I was rooting for the 49's with the understanding that we can put together a better Steelers team next season and  make it to the Super Bowl AND then we would have climbed the stairway to seven...putting us two rings ahead. Oh well,  all in all it was a pretty good game and a hell of a spectacle...so I guess that's all I can ask if the Steelers aren't in it.

In between making fresh guacamole and icing down a six pack of Brooklyn Brown Ale, I put a lot of studio time in the last few days. Its very nice to have a warm studio space during the winter here in western Pa. In the main work space of the studio there are 2 radiators that really keep the place very comfortable. While throwing I don't need anything heavier than a t-shirt and I can be just fine with an old flannel shirt on when doing surface work at the table. But there are draw backs to a lot of heat in a ceramic studio...fast drying can be a bitch, as evidenced in the cracking of a couple large wall platters I spent a couple hours carving.(above image of platter with hairline cracks) I have since learned my lesson and now make sure to cover and let dry much slower, even when finished with a piece. The plus side of the radiators is that I can make work
faster...like these three large bottomless pieces...

...thrown and sat on the radiator for about a little bit while I worked on some slabs...very soon they were dry enough to shape them into ovals and add bottoms and a little later, clean up and add side handles and slip...all within the day.

The next day I was able to carve completely around the pieces, even turning them upside down to carve at the base of the foot.

I am working on carving out these cloud like surfaces and I think they look pretty good on these long horizontal forms especially. Cloud like...blobby...sorta intestinal but either way they will provide an area of off white space  in contrast to the  brown clay body. This is where I will be firing my decal imagery...and the split lip and interior will be where you will find rich glazes that will be doing their thang. The cloud like forms on the surface are part of what I am now calling my "castaways" series... referring back to my last post about  "Life of Pi". I love this idea and continue to think back to this book, especially to the passage about being a castaway...that the only thing that is always a constant is our humble position between the sky above and ground, or in this case sea, beneath our feet. The idea that we are all caught up in what Pi's author Yann Martel called a "harrowing ballet of circles"...that we are hapless witnesses to our environments in a state of constant flux and that we are at the mercy of this maelstrom just floating along encountering life as it comes and in whatever form it comes is the stuff of inspiration for my surface imagery.

Firing this week for the first time in the new kiln!...Keep checking in...stay warm out there.

Castaways

Winter in western PA is slow and tedious and if your not careful, your own pace can become glacial as well. The weather has been particularly frigid and yesterday we got about four to six more inches of the white fluffy stuff dumped all over us. That certainly does not help a persons motivation for venturing past their front porch.

But you do have to get out in it...snow, crappy roads and all. If I didn't we would be dining on dachshund and after spending a bundle on spinal surgery for him, he would only amount to a few days of five star dining...maybe if I had a full size and could get at least a solid week of good eating....hmmm. But I digress, where I was going with this is that it is hard to establish routines. Routines are important to studio work and I have been trying but I'm having little success.

The beginning of this year kicked me hard with a stomach flu, another major dental issue, the above mentioned surgery for my wiener dog and sadly, the passing of my father-in-law. This was all in the first three weeks of January and I am beginning to wonder if I haven't gotten all the bad shit out of the way for at least the next six months. So as I struggle to get back into a good studio routine along with a gym/racquetball routine, I have been formulating the new body of work and eeking out some pieces. It looks as if I will have my first full load bisque firing next week in my new kiln. That's exciting news to me...20 or so new mugs and a bunch of large bowls and wall platters. The bowls and wall platters are really where my head has been and really what this post is about. They are canvases for my new layered compositions...decals of course, but also my new surface treatments. I have been doing a lot of carving and am interested in integrating those areas as fragmented portions of background.

It was my holiday reading that set this idea in motion. I picked up the book "Life of Pi" by Yann Martell in the airport so I could kill time between layovers and ended up deeply involved in this great book. If you have not read this book, I highly recommend it. I wanted to see the movie but my cinematic choices are often determined more by my young daughter so the book felt like a good idea. The book is a wonderful story of life, faith, suffering, loss and perseverance. There is a particular passage that really got me thinking and made sense to me, directly relating to the new imagery and surface work I wanted to make as well as being very pertinent to my life right now.

"To be a castaway is to be a point perpetually at the center of a circle. However much things appear to change-the sea may shift from whisper to rage, the sky might go from fresh blue to blinding white to darkest black- the geometry never changes. Your gaze is always a radius. The circumference is ever great. In fact, the circles multiply. To be a castaway is to be caught in a harrowing ballet of circles. You are at the center of one circle, while above you two opposing circles spin about. The sun distresses you like a crowd, a noisy invasive crowd that makes you cup your ears, that makes you close your eyes, that makes you want to hide. The moon distresses you by silently reminding you of your solitude; you open your eyes wide to escape your loneliness. When you look up, you sometimes wonder if at the center of a solar storm, if in the middle of the Sea of Tranquility , there isn't another one like you also looking up, also trapped by geometry, also struggling with fear, rage, madness, hopelessness, apathy."

Sea and sky and a host of characters will populate these pieces...in a less harrowing ballet of circles. Enjoy my black and white images of the works in progress...almost their infancy...and stop back by to see how the firings are going. Ahoy castaways...remember there is a lot you can do even when you are trapped in a 26 foot lifeboat with a Bengal Tiger.

2013 Artist Interview Series #1

Bobby Tso

HAPPY NEW YEAR!...OK, so I am a little late.

 I am back in the tundra that is western PA, fresh off the plane from spending the New Year celebration down in a much more temperate climate, filling my belly with fresh shrimp and Bloody Marys...Florida. And I want to forget about all that "best of 2012" crap and simply start anew this chilly morn. Lets just plow on through and leave 2012 sitting by the curb. 2013 has much more to offer, hope your buckled in!

I said it was coming and now its here...the homefry sketchbook artist interview series! WOOHOO! This is number one of hopefully many raw, unfiltered, and interesting interviews with artists this year. To kick this series off, I have chosen a special artist that I have had the pleasure of working with and have enjoyed watching the evolution of his most recent body of work while finishing his M.F.A. degree at the University of Iowa.... Kwak-Pong "Bobby" Tso...Bobby graciously answered questions and provided me with plenty of great images of his work over the holidays, so thank you  once again to Bobby Tso! I am sure this won't be the last you hear of Mr. Tso. Click on the pics to see larger. Also see more at Bobby's website HERE.

homefry sketchbook: First of all, I would like to extend a hearty congratulations to you on being the first artist in this hoped to be long lived series of fascinating clay based interviews. We here at homefry sketchbook are anxiously awaiting your responses to the following deeply probing questions…as are the millions (OK, maybe not actually millions but "some" at least) of dedicated blog readers...

hs: To be clear for all the readers, homefry sketchbook has been Facebook friends with you for a while now and in further disclosure, first met you several years ago during a summer residency at Chautauqua School of Art in Chautauqua, New York. Is this information true to the best of your recollection and or do you have anything to add?

Bobby Tso: Yea,Sir!
I have been friend with Homefry Sketchbook for almost 4years now I believe! It was a wonderful summer and I am so thankful for knowing Captain Kyle!

hs: Please take a moment to introduce yourself and let everyone know where you are geographically located and what you might be up to these days…then we will start with your most current body of work…

BT: I am from HongKong China, the southern part China, we love pet and we pet them we don’t eat them there if anyone is interested to know. I am currently a graduate student at University of Iowa, Iowa City, where I have been spend the past 3 years getting my Master of Fine Art Degree.

hs: How did your recent body of work manifest itself conceptually? Can you elaborate on your thoughts about why you are creating this body of work? What’s your biggest point of reference for your work?

BT: So it is a very long story, you may want some coffee, eat something sweet or both!  So the core ideas of this recent body of work are to enrich the nature and weight of materials. By producing a clear and concise space, I am able to create a connection in the relationship between one object to another. This connection is a metaphor to express the importance of this miscellaneous, compact relationship, using reduction, negation, and clarification to achieve a simplified composition.

This is the basic idea and I got more!

Here is how I discover my recent work! While working every day in the studio, I realize what's missing in the day to day creative process, it is the “process of discovering a question”, and for me this question lead me to understand something not by define it or describe it, is to feel it, I am inspired by something that is recognizable but has an uncertain function, it is taking something that we think we already know and making it unknown thrills us afresh with its reality and deepens our understanding of it. Most of my works are influenced by man-made objects; something like a view of building blocks from the sky, transformer boxes out in the field, and strange formations on the roof, push bottom, gears, even food!

I believe each material has its own “Weight”; when I am organizing my compositions in my studio practice, I focus on how to balance those “Weights” by playing with the objects and rearranging them. In do so I am able to achieve the composition that interacts with volume, space and light. I embrace this abstracted space, through the characteristics of different materials, and express the qualities of balance, weight, and texture. Each physical and conceptual element of the materials is now able to provide the viewer with a clear direction, through the control of differences within my compositions.

 Materials express itself in its simple form, by being honest to the materials and keeping them truer; this interest brings that “weight” I spoke of earlier out of my materials. Through sensation, communication, investigation, and exploration, material start to take on a life of its own and create meaning. When less become more, the art work becomes quiet yet majestic, complex but minimal.

hs: On your website  http://bobbytso.com you also feature installation, wood and metals work, all with this recurring minimal form . What is your fascination with the reduced form and/or this sense of sculptural abstraction and could you ever get tired of it?

BT: I will never get tired of it, they just keep on making me think!!! By the way this is interesting question that not many people ask; I always think it is very strange that sometime somehow things happen that will make you think about stuff that is not totally related

One of the metaphor/idea I  have about the work that I do, is closely related to a simple thing like a nut and bolt, most people/ us talk about big picture a lot, which i think is funny that the way we view stuff make us miss/overlook something that are small but important, like the nuts and bolts, everything has is purpose(the reason for which something exists) without those small objects/pictures we will never get to the big picture, a building without those nuts and bolts will fail, like us without those little thing we do will not make who we are. to understand the big picture or what we do we have to understand and look at everything we do, like to know someone, is to understand what they eat, what they drink or even what they wear so we can understand who they are in a raw format, break it down to the bare minimal so we can understand and move by it.

I think this make a lot of sense to me and that is why my work is geared toward  the minimal form, I think/I guess.

hs: I really love, love, love the simple doughnut and square shaped pieces that seem to rest on various objects. If form is so important in the pieces, how do the truly stunning patterned surfaces fit in to the works?

BT:The patterned doughnuts are actually related more to my recent trip to Jingdezhen, China, where the blue and white China was born! I was influenced by the long and wonderful history of China ware, and because I was never expose to clay when I was home, so I decided to make those pieces and be connected to my home country

hs: Would you mind giving a little technical information to the readers as to how you create the surface decorations?

BT: so they are actually the famous decal! In Jingdezhen, China, you can pick up any kind of decal with all kind of pattern! So they are decal that I cut in to size for my doughnuts.

hs: Please let us know if you have been showing anywhere recently and what are your plans for the near future?

BT: I just finish up my MFA show, and I am having a piece in a show call beyond the brickyard at the Archie Bray Foundation for the Ceramics arts in February.  And I am also having a piece in a show call Functional/Dysfunctional National Juried Ceramics Competition at Morean Art Center, St.Petersburg,FL

hs: By the way, do you make pots at all? Did you ever? Will you ever again make pots?

BT: Yes I do, I was one of the TA for wheel throwing class, and once a while I still make pots to keep myself working and think thing over!

hs: If you’re like me, you look at A LOT of different peoples work…is there anybody current that you are really into…in ceramics or outside ceramics.

BT: I am really into my friends Mike Jabbur’s pottery and Andy Casto’s sculptural objects

Outside of ceramics, I look at a lot of design’s work from website like fab.com, and notcot.org, sometime they will have really cool stuff that is simple but interesting

hs: We here at the homefry sketchbook are really into music and each post we feature a youtube video of music that is in heavy rotation around the studio/office/ipod…who is it that you are listening to in the studio these days, or are you a book on tape guy, TV guy, or just pure silence type guy?

BT: I think I am the headphone plug-in kind of guy, I have been looping Blackmill and Passion Pit a lot!

But a really wonderful friend told me about  Starfucker, and basically I created my whole MFA show by looping Starfucker from the time I wake up till I Sleep….usually that is from 8- 2 or 3 in the morning!

Thanks Kyle!!!!!!!!

hs: Thank you Bobby and we wish you the best ...Happy New Year

Bobby Tso