Project No.4: "Finished Porcelain Souvenirs"

Throughout the project I made several different shaped envelopes of different sizes. I had a lot of fun working with porcelain. I gained much experience through this project. I learned that there is no reason to fear porcelain like i did before. I like it now but I must say it is a very stubborn material but through faults and failures and constant desire to learn and achieve what was aimed, the end result pays off. I am very happy with the way the works( souvenirs) turned out.

 envelopes after firing

Glazed envelope after 120 dgree firing

Other envelopes with various designs that were just painted with porcelain slip and not glazed.

 Nothing cracked or changed shape much and the 1220 degree firing, just as i expected worked perfectly and works did not need to be glazed. They looked good the way they were.

Project No.4: "Porcelain, Slip and Underglaze Colours"

I thought for a while on what clay I should use to make the envelopes and the answer did not wait for long. Although just the word porcelain made me fear to work with it, I still chose it because I knew that I would learn so much from it. It was a good choice as the porcelain is very delicate.

It was not easy working with it but bit by bit I learned about it and it seemed to like me too. First I wanted to make the pieces and fire them to 1040 degrees, then paint on the imagery with underglazes and then glaze it and fire it again to 1220 degrees. (Is the best because if higher the underglazes would burn out) But thinking about it more I realised that it would be very time consuming. Porcelain doesn’t needs 2 firings if I painted on with porcelain slips. So I made porcelain slips and made few tests which fired to 1220, and they came out very well. I worked in that way for the rest of the project. Although I did make one work were I used underglazes as an experiment. That work was fired twice. 

Porcelain envelope with a slip design, ready to go into 1220 degree firing.

Other different scale envelopes made out of porcelain and painted with slip

Bisque fired porcelain envelope with underglaze design painted on.

Project No. 4: "Souvenir from Hunt Museum"

This project was based around the idea of souvenirs and what a souvenir means to every individual in class. We all had to make a souvenir inspired by Hunt Museum and its collection.

The first thing, I went on the trip to the Museum and observed all 3 floors of collections and artifacts, meanwhile at the back of my head thinking what souvenir means to me and what shape it could take. After some time thinking and analysing I recalled that I have a huge box of envelopes at home, and those are not for sending away letters. They serve a different purpose. Every time I go away somewhere I collect all the memories in to those envelopes. All the sketches I make of things that appeal to me, various tickets, photographs, sugars from restaurants or cafes all go into the envelopes. This is the kind of souvenir I bring for myself from the places I visit and I show them to my friends if I want to share what I’ve experienced .

slightly modified envelopes

Once I decided on the shape inspiration for the souvenir now I had to choose what would make it the souvenir of the Hunt Museum. I kept asking myself, what would I put into my envelope if I was first time visiting the Museum? With that question in my head I tried to remember my first trip into the museum. From the first visit and to the present time the work that fascinated me the most was the painting of Suzanne Botterel by Leech. The technique I love the most. I myself like to draw and paint in that way, when the lines are visible. It has so much energy in it. The flower on this painting is very appealing to my eye.

Apart from this painting there were many other things that I liked, I would even say too many. But my intention was to keep my work clear and simple. I did not want to over complicate it with too many unnecessary details. Therefore I used patterns from different unrelated to each other works to decorate the rims of the envelopes but the main subject was the Leeches painting. 

Suzanne Botterel painting by Leech

Various details from the painting

favourite detail of flowers

Project No. 3: "Personal Project"

In this project we had to choose a ceramic artist who uses one or several techniques that we learned in the workshops in the first semester. The works of the ceramicists that one was goint to choose was also suppose to be appealing to the individual. After the choice was made, everyone had to learn more about the techniques the artist uses and try some of them our self.

I chose Laurie Shaman. She is a studio potter in Chicago, United States. I came across her works when was looking through the book "500 Plates". Her works stood out to me instantly, they strike me with their beautiful imagery and techniques. I found her works very close to my own creative ideas. She works with every day life images and mostly depicts nature, people, animals, old cities and rural streets on her ceramic works. Her hand built porcelain and white stoneware works are like canvases for the beautiful underglaze paintings.

Shaman's plate depicting birds

Laurie slab builts her works with either mid-range porcelain or white erthenware clay. Firts the work gets bisque fired to 1040 in electric kiln. Then after liner glazing, all the textural areas are brushed with underglazes and wiped down to enhance the lines and marks. Next, the underglazes are applied by slip traling, sponging and brushing to achieve further tonality and line definition, while sometimes using the sgraffito technique for a wood-like effect. When all that done, the works get glazed with a clear glaze to seal the surface and fired in electric kiln to Cone 6/ 1220 degrees C. 

I tried to experiment with the techniques that Shaman uses. I used porcelain and I slab rolled it and cut into tiles. I textured it with a wooden tool and put it into 1040 firing. I made different colour underglazes by mixing the pigments with some sugar (so it sticks to the clay body) and warm water. I brushed, sponged and wiped the underglazes on the surface of tiles just as Shaman does. I chose some of my own imagery and some of Shaman's.

 

I then made couple of clear 1220 degree firing glazes (1220 is best temperature because the underglazes burn out if temperature is higher). Out of all I chose a transparent semi-matt glaze which looked the best on tiles.

My own imagery

Experiment No.1

Experiment No.2

Image from Shaman's works