Ceramics show - A success!

Thanks for all who came out to support me in the 2009 CCNY Student Ceramics show.
It was a great turn out and lots of fun, the show has come down today but here are some photos of a couple of my finished pieces.

Student show - A success!

Thanks for all who came out to support me in the 2009 CCNY Student Ceramics show.
It was a great turn out and lots of fun, the show has come down, but here are some photos of a couple of my finished pieces. The shiny ones are like The Butterfly People on acid or something, but the terra cotta one is like a real return to nature and the natural material.

UPDATE 03-06-09

Big update here.
Lots of last minute glazing and firing being done here to prepare for the ceramics show which takes place on the 12th, but is being set-up tomorrow morning. I will be helping to set it up and so will be able to be involved directly in the process.

I decided to glaze the terra-cotta vases with sculpted figures on them, for better or for worst, but I couldn’t find a glaze that I liked so I made my own iron oxide glaze. Lots of notes being taken just in case I like the results I can repeat them.

So I glazed the bulbous pot that I made with the three girls looking over the edge with this iron oxide glaze, but I also glazed a few small pieces with it as well, but accidentally used RED SAND not iron oxide for some of the pieces (thank goodness not the important ones).

This old piece here was finally glazed, it was actually living in my fish tank for sometime and the natural terra-cotta color went well with everything, but for the show I thought I should just do something really insane and crazy so I painted it like I would if I didn’t have the thought that anyone would ever see it, so I used a metallic glaze, a blue glaze, and a yellow glaze and I am anxious to see how she fires.

Here you can see the stacked kiln (top hat) which has some of my pieces, they are not all mine, but some of them are, like the ones with the girls on them and the egg-shaped piece: stilted and ready to run with emerald green and bronze glazes!

That cool centralized pot is not mine unfortunately ;-)

I added a little Christmas red to the figure just in case the kiln fires cold, if it fires hot it will turn black but that is absolutely fine.

The cylinder there on the right I did not make, but I did glaze it in patches for some tests because I don’t know what some things look like.

The two bulbs below will not be in the show, but hopefully will have some gorgeous glazes on them soon.

Figure pot here will not be green when it comes out, it will be BLACK and shiny!

These four reiterate why tests are important, they are tests of new glazes that I do not know how they look, as you can see the harlem heights blue is really crawly so will not be used by me, yet the green and grays are beautiful and definitely have a future with my pieces.

Below are some finished pieces that were finally glazed and are out of the kiln.

Back of same piece

Ruined (glaze ran)

A lot like my pen on paper doodles from the past

My new glaze to alter, since this is semitransparent, I thought I could play around with using it with varying amounts of iron oxide and maybe granular rutile.

Come one, come all

First of all, this is FREE
Second of all this is supporting ME
and third of all, you have nothing better to do and I gave you a weeks notice!
All jokes aside, I am participating in the annual student ceramic show at City College in Harlem next week, I am setting up this show and am sure to have an entire section with my work only. This is NOT polymer clay, but I can assure you that there will be a few figures of mine, in a way transformed INTO clay from polymer which is amazing. I think this is a nice retrospective of my work until the current point although it is a bit more scattered as far as subject matter goes than a traditional gallery would be. There is something for everyone, look for the reflective, metallic piece, its new!
I will be there to also meet/greet and talk about my work as well as support all the ceramic artists participating in the show.
Thursday the 12th, at FIVE PM (actual opening by Sylvia Netzer will be at 5:30pm)
The event will be in the Compton-Goethals building which is located on the South East corner of Amsterdam and 140th street, tell security you are here for the ceramics show in room 134 or in "the gallery". You can get there by car, cab, or take the A, C, B, D to 145th or the 1 to 137th street City College.
Hope to see you there and feel free to click on the picture above and print it out!

SHOW 2009

First of all, this is FREE

Second of all this is supporting ME

and third of all, you have nothing better to do and I gave you a weeks notice!

All jokes aside, I am participating in the annual student ceramic show at City College in Harlem next week, I am setting up this show and am sure to have an entire section with my work only. I think this is a nice retrospective of my work until the current point although it is a bit more scattered as far as subject matter goes than a traditional gallery would be. There is something for everyone, look for the reflective, metallic piece, its new!

I will be there to also meet/greet and talk about my work as well as support all the ceramic artists participating in the show.

Thursday the 12th, at FIVE PM (actual opening by Sylvia Netzer will be at 5:30pm)

The event will be in the Compton-Goethals building which is located on the South East corner of Amsterdam and 140th street, tell security you are here for the ceramics show in room 134 or in "the gallery". You can get there by car, cab, or take the A, C, B, D to 145th or the 1 to 137th street City College.

Hope to see you there and feel free to click on the picture above and print it out!

I really like this latest piece because it sort of goes against what everyone else (not in the ceramic world, but at school) is trying to do. Most people want perfectly symmetrical pots especially when throwing on the wheel. I feel it is much more challenging to make something like this on the wheel which was created from a thrown cylinder and then thrown so thin that it began to buckle and collapse, after it was dry enough I then hand built the elements seen on it.
Its a very special piece because the figure and the flora/fauna on the pot finally relate to the thrown piece because the piece is very organic and looks somewhat like the earth or some rock formation of sorts. The piece is symbolic, allusions to the biblical Eve are evident with the snake on her shoulder, but there is a tiny clay butterfly on her arm as well to show her beauty and delicateness. The bananna leaves and plantains/banannas are a personal touch since I am half Dominican. She shares the pot with birds, two faces, and a turtle as well, and her hands sprout roots which "anchor" her to the form.
I cant wait until this is finished.

Thats gotta be the worlds smallest ceramic butterfly.

The piece in the last blog has been finished, I trimmed the foot in and also painted it black but then removed the engobe with water pressure, exposing the grog beneath the figures, giving them a rough texture.
I think the vertical lines enhance the form of the pot.