Clay Weekend

I spent a good portion of my weekend up at the Northern Clay Center checking out all of the amazing potters on display for the annual American Pottery Festival. The quality of the work was just spectacular. The thing I love about going to ceramic shows is that not only do you get to see work that you've often only seen in slides or on the internet, but you get to pick it up and touch it! Such fun... I also caught a glimpse of some of my new favorite pottery stars - Naomi Cleary and Liz Zlot Summerfeld. This morning I took a short (but info-packed) workshop with Gail Kendal, which gave me some great insights into working with low fire clay.


I'm all signed up to take a class with Margaret Bohls at NCC this coming fall -- I can't wait for it to get started so I can get back into the studio and start making pots. The topic is just what I need, too - low fire glaze chemistry. Yea! Hopefully I can clear up some of my pesky glazing problems and get to a place where I have a few glazes I enjoy using and understand well. I am looking forward to the day when I can think clearly about how I am going to glaze a pot before I even begin to throw...

New Home

I have neglected this poor blog for far too long now. It's time to get myself back in the habit of updating regularly. Although, even with my sporadic posting habits, it's still an excellent reminder of change and growth. I'm amazed by how easy it is to forget where we start from - this is an ideal place to collect and document ideas, progress and new directions. So even though I've been away for seven months now (geez!) I'm going to jump back into the blogging world as I enter into a new chapter of my ceramic work and my life.

A big part of my blogging absence has to do with Aaron and my relocation from Pittsburgh to Minneapolis. It's scary to say this, but the last time I touched clay was back in March, right before NCECA (double geez!). In all honesty, it's been great to have an extensive break - I think I'm a person who needs time to digest and regroup/recharge away from my medium. But, I'm to the point now where I am itching to get my hands back into clay. Since I still don't quite have a studio lined up, I've been working to coalesce some of the ideas I've been mulling over surrounding food and energy in my sketchbook. Realizing these ideas in clay will probably be an entirely different story all together...




I went down to Carleton (my alma mater) with Aaron last week for the first time since I graduated in 2001. It was amazing to be back on campus and exciting to realize that I will be able to visit on a more regular basis than every seven years! On the way down we stopped to snap some photos of cornfields for me to use in my work. I'd like to get a few good shots of soy and wheat as well so I can work on some commodity themed pots....




While we were in Northfield we also hit up the Steam and Engine show, where we saw our good friend Anne Sawyer sing AND I got to get my fill of tractor pictures. Some of these will definitely be finding their way into my work...

Patience...

It's crazy to look back and see that I dipped my toe into the low fire waters last June. I would never have guessed that it's been eight months now! It's taken awhile, but I feel like some things are sinking in and some concrete ideas are taking shape (see the set of tumblers below). Exciting!

What's for Dinner? (view 1)
What's for Dinner? (view 2)

What's for Dinner? (view 3)

What is Art?

Here's your answer - hee hee!

Pancake Fun

Okay, so this isn't exactly ceramic related, but, man, it is funny! Yea pancake olympics!!

Long Time, No See

I always seem to have such good intentions about keeping up regularly on blogging, and then somehow three months slip by and I haven't posted a thing. Man. A quick ceramic update... I took a class on mosaic and have been happily making zillions of little tiles for my table project. The class is now a few weeks over and my table is still in pieces, but it will get there. Eventually. I've also been working on a new prototype for another slipcasting project, making plates as test pieces for the low fire kiln, and working on a platter project for my Dad. Lots to think about and keep me busy -- not even considering all of the NCECA madness! I hope to at some point start getting some images up here, it would be great to document all that is going on with my many clay adventures.

Revisiting Wood

It's been three years since I last participated in a wood firing and I've only been a part of two. This past weekend I had the chance to put work in a kiln built last year by Jim Dugan. It's a beauty of a kiln and in a spectacular location in Aurora, West Virginia. I'm still recovering from the strange sleeping patterns I had last week and getting anxious to see the results of all that hard work!

We had some exciting moments during the firing -- some a little TOO exciting... the roof of Megan's beautiful kiln shed caught on fire while we were firing. Everyone handled it beautifully, but we did seem to lose some of our momentum after that. Still seemed to be a great firing though -- most parts of the kiln got to temperature. We will unload this Sunday, I'll post some images as soon as I get them back.