photo-ie day...

ahhhhh nothing like a lurgy to keep me inside in the warm and a great excuse to shoot some new pics... most of these guys are from the last firing in fact all but the green mug!! i managed to iron out some of the bugs in my setup and apart from the occasional glare really happy with the setup.. I also had a bash at making a gif animation for the header but blogger wont run it anyone have any ideas about gifs?? the test ran perfectly in photoshop, just playing around and putting a fresh face on things here, enjoy the gallery :))

a bit sketchy...

It's incredibly chilly up in the studio even with my little heater on...so the last of my bowl-a-thon bowls are trimmed and cleaned up the pots for rakuing for the St Ignatius show in SALA month I had white fingers and numb hands, so back inside and after some warming soup my fingers are back, yey!!!!

I thought I'd share some of the sketches I did while away...not many really I was battling jetlag most of the time so didn't do as many as I would have liked ...anyhoo The canoe is in the foyer of the Indigenous Museum at Washington DC just amazing the amount of reed that must be in this piece and very beautiful with the textures running in circular formation..

The second sketch is on ron's porch i started drawing him literally got half way and off he darted so doug sat in for the rest of the sketch, rather fun really I just kept going with the lines going all over each other...

And a sketch of the soda kiln i'd like to build eventually.. It may still happen this year I'm not sure at least I have seen heaps of kilns now and have a pretty good idea of what i need to do now..

So lot's happening and firing the big club kiln this wkd and rakuing too...so catchup then and feel free to drop by the club on saturday Crouch rd Golden Grove if you're nearby..

renovators delight...

  well, mine anyway!!!

the beast had a major facelift today with capacity for two more sets of shelves depending on the work of course.. A massive thanks to kevin, mr super welder.. I kept the cups of tea coming amongst warnings to sheild my eyes.. to which i complied while pointing and shooting from my phone :)) I'm amazed pretty much kept him in the frame for all of said pics and vids...

All that is left is the fibre work, I'll be cutting up my old door to use as much as possible of the old stuff and making a square to round collar for the exit flue that should be fun making that fit and as soon as possible as SALA is looming near and lots of work to be fired...

 and now for some very sad news, my flip died....oh dear after running the tech gauntlet and trying everything to remedy the prob I think it has to be said that it served me well for 3 years and now the search for a replacement...hello eb#y

welding by kevin capaldi, tea by me, tunes by bellowhead 'little sally racket' ;) thanks H

firing just cracked...

Woohoo it's amazing how efficient a firing can be with new gas tanks!!!....

Saturdays firing was quick for me 9hours and done and cone 10 perhaps a little overdone for the new satin shino I was using, they have all come up glossy...

anyhoo lovely all the same so here's a quick look at firing day and the unload from tonight..
The new small cups are part of my SALA work and medium size trays will be on the making menu this week, well that's a wrap...

More happening Monday with kiln alterations. Kevin will be coming over and look out for the sparks flying from my studio.. My kiln beast is about to grow up a bit and Tuesday is another bowl-a-thon with my friends Erin and Anna too we will be keeping in touch via facebook as the day goes and a tally at the end, you can join in via facebook if you'd like... enjoy the vid...

the raven has landed...

   hey cindy the raven has landed :)) 

 it will really freak out the wild life up the garden cant wait to test her out :P hehehhe...

I got this sweet package today in the post along with a lovely card and some flags which will brighten up the garden no end at the mo!! And being really cold and damp and a bit of green and orange will work a treat under the verandah where my pug is.. cheers my friend what a lovely treat..

Anyhoo most of today was spent immersed in illustrations for the tiles...my next body of work for my sala show....some of the pieces will be stencils and some silkscreened and today was lots of thinking about what works and what doesn't and what do I want to say with these pieces..they are influenced by a Hopper etching that really grabbed me, it's a street scene from a high perspective looking down on a corner footpath.. this motif occurs a lot in Hoppers work it's the cafe that has been 'thrashed' in the nicest possible way with so much pop art today....you know the one marilyn and james dean hanging out in the diner..

So the image sparks a sense of the lone viewer from a high up window watching the goings on below....i love that street corner to me it references the artist eye.. we observe so much, daily happenings, strange events.... ones of coincidence and mundane and yet so interesting...anyhoo since my interest is also in  

surface textures and wild native creatures in the suburban landscape... so why not combine them all and see how they get on in the streetscape as neighbours.... design wise I think it will be interesting, concept wise I hope i can pull it off...we shall see

and lastly a use for old xrays... a stencil cut from today, my leaf motif somewhere for the birds to hang out!!

one word KLINE...

This was one jam packed day!! our second stop was Mr Michael Kline's Pottery...I'll let the images speak coz there be plenty of them...

I rather enjoyed this stop at MK's workshop we checked out the space played with local clay and wandered around some confederate gravestones, Doug got to jump in the clay pit, avoid the poison ivy and Hannah did her best Sound of Music pose on the hillside :)) and we drank tea...and ron got to talk shop with MK.

We got to fondle lots of pots and took home our very own samples of his lovely work and some super brushworked paper plates, mines still atop the fridge!

Thankyou MK I trust a well deserved break from sawdust and dirt gets you recharged for other things...well enjoy the Kline experience..

reconciliation week @ tea tree gully library

reconciliation week @ tea tree gully library

This show is up til the end of this week go and check out the cool works on the foyer walls and some great whittling by the semaphore zebra finch mens group.. there's really good prices for some local aboriginal art for your place...