A bit of new!

Well I ended up making a lot of custom work over the past month or so and, as with custom, making extras is the key! Now that the orders are almost all off and on their way, I have some of the extra pieces I'll be posting in my Etsy shop as I seem to have gotten some positive feedback on the new shades and styles of vases I have been working on. 

I recently had a short turn-around request for a large order with a design firm for a show home with some of my new vases in my classic glazed stripes.  They asked if I would be able to create a custom yellow glaze for the design and sent me a swatch of fabric they were trying to match.  As luck would have it, the yellow stain I thought would be perfect for the fabric swatch was no longer available so I mixed 3 different stains and then glazed blind the order (with extras) for this new harvest yellow glaze, crossing my fingers it would turn out ok! I really like the new shade- it's got a wonderful golden glow to the yellow that I think I'll keep as part of my regular work for a while. 

Speaking of new, I am starting to really get the hang of my newest slip-cast glaze designs- the round cylinder 9" and 12.5" vases that you see above!  Over the past few years, I have been wheel-throwing my cylinder vases and was having trouble getting my grey glaze to fit the wheel-throwing clay body I have been using.  Lots of bubbles and blisters in the throwing body, silky smooth in the porcelain slip-casting body.  I also find it hard to sit at the wheel for long periods of time- I like to throw multiple shapes in one sitting, not just the same thing over and over.  So when I start dreading throwing, then I start planning how to make the design into a mould.

I currently have only 1 master-mould of each and they are not easy to cast, but I'm slowly figuring it out.  This big grey striped vase, along with 3 others that went to the show home, was the first of the big vases that actually turned out and didn't warp (longer casting time + very little handling when pulling the piece out of the mould = no warping :).  So I'm very excited about the new size and am looking forward to getting a few more of these finished in different colours.  These are real statement pieces- they really hold some presence and look great in a grouping!  

Lastly I have some new wheel-thrown vase designs I have been working on.  It has been nice to try out new forms and play with the herringbone pattern or colour dip pattern on them! These are ooak vases and perhaps at some point I would make a mould of them, but for now, I am enjoying the variety of them.  Slip-casting some of my work frees me up to explore new forms on the wheel and also new glazing designs, so there have been some big advantages for me to move into that direction, especially with vases.  On the other hand, I have spent the week on the wheel, throwing teapots and bowls, and I would never dream of slip-casting those pieces.  It's nice to still see the throwing lines in a bowl or on the inside of a teapot and I still cherish making these items in this way.  

Keeping motivated

 It's my birthday this week and things are being kept pretty low-key around here.  My boys are at my folk's place all week while work continues on the largest order I've ever filled.  It's not for the faint of heart these large orders.  It's a whole lot of intensely physical work and I've been going to bed with sore muscles from all the lifting and pouring of molds in my little studio. I'm so grateful to have Sarah with me in the studio this summer- her energy and enthusiasm is certainly helping me stay motivated to keep at it.  At the rate we are going, we'll only have 1 more week of slip-casting, and the rest of the summer will be glazing, glazing and more glazing.  If all goes as planned, the bulk of the order will be finished by the end of the summer (and by the time Sarah has to go back to school), so I'm just finishing up the last bits in time to send it off early October.  By then I'll be full-on in Holiday mode.  Phew, what a year!!

photos:  The waterlilies at the studio are blooming again!
I remembered I had this photo kicking around- circa 1981 or 82.  Love the wallpaper, and clearly, I am ready to party!!

the difference between: wheel-throwing verses slip-casting

So I have a 'confession' to make.  It's the kind of dilemma that's been running through my head since I first embarked on making ceramics full-time.  It's the whole wheel-thrown verses slip-casting debate.  It's a discussion I've had with numerous ceramic people and I thought I would bring it up on my blog. To get started, my mugs in question.  The two images, one slip-cast, one wheel-thrown.  Photographed at different times so the lighting in one is darker than the lighting in the other.  Although the clay is slightly different so my glazes are a little brighter on the porcelain than 'porcelaineous' clay body.  You be the judge- is one 'better' than the other?  Can you tell the difference in how they were made?

About 2 years ago now I embarked on my first slip-cast project.  I had a wheel-thrown and altered bottle vase form that I wanted to make multiples of.  The drying time on this form, being altered with a new bottom being put on to oval it off, was taking way too long and I really wanted a 'blank canvas' to put glaze designs on.  The more I thought about it, the more it made sense to look into making a mold out of it.  So I got in touch with Russell Hackney, a master mold-maker who's worked on making prototypes of intricate clocks for the Queen, no less.  It was a pricey venture to get it the master and molds made, but I didn't want to fuss with my own lack of skill in the mold-making category- I wanted to put my best foot forward and come out with a near exact replica of my original design. 

In 2010 I decided, after much deliberation and months and months of sitting down with each little wedged 1 lb ball of clay, making hundreds of mugs with the same 2 basic forms, not ever quite keeping up with my orders because I didn't have time to make other things, to make my 2 mug designs into molds.  This was the hardest decision for me yet.  I really love looking inside a wheel-thrown mug and seeing throwing lines on the inside.  My outsides are pretty void of throwing lines because I use a rib to smooth them out since my glazing method works a lot easier if I have a smooth surface, so the outsides would generally be the same.  But the insides would be, different.  Perhaps a little too manufactured.  Regardless, I needed a break.  I was beginning to dread making mugs all the time. My body was telling me it needed a break from throwing, and my head was saying it didn't make financial sense for me to wheel-throw each and every piece that I make.  So I took the plunge and made my mug designs into a mold and have been slip-casting them since last spring.  Just the tall mugs, not the little latte mugs, or my cups, or my bowls, or my platters, or my teapots, or my espresso cups, or my plates.  
Now slip-casting itself was no small leap for me to make.  I had to find a good slip recipe and mix slip by hand (measure out dry materials, sieve it, mix with a drill mixer for 2 hours, allow for air bubbles to settle for a few days before mixing for another hour).  The trial and error of this process ruined a lot of work before I started to see results.  The molds themselves are not a cheap investment to make.  And I still pour them, pull them out of the mold, clean up the seams, put handles on them before they can be bisqued and glazed by hand.  But the big advantage is the drying time.  They don't need take nearly as long to dry out as wheel-thrown work does.  And they are all the same size so if someone orders multiples or comes back for a second mug, it will be the same size.  The handles always feel great and are big enough for different hands to hold it.  The whole process has freed up some of my time to work on new designs and new glazing patterns.  In the end I feel like it was the right decision to make, but sometimes with a twinge of guilt.  I know there are some amazing ceramic artists out there who make their work exclusively with molds.  I also know die-hard wheel-throwers/hand-builders that wouldn't touch a mold and put down the process as being too 'manufactured'.  In general the work I see coming out of undergraduate schools these days is all slip-cast.  Generally people don't seem to have the time to invest in throwing on the wheel to make a form they have in their head, so they become mold-makers and slip-cast.  And in the world of design, it's a widely accepted practice.  But I still sense a stigma attached to slip-casting as though it's a cop-out, or easier somehow than wheel-throwing. 

In the studio the other day, putting on handles...

So I'm curious what your impressions of slip-casting are.  Do you place value on slip-casting verses wheel-throwing?  If you make ceramics, have you tried both wheel-throwing or slip-casting and do you choose one over the other? 

Making pretty molds

 

 Mold-making is something I don't normally do to make my ceramics, but it's a skill I'd like to develop.  Every now and again when I've done an intense stint of steady wheel-throwing, trimming and glazing and I get that nagging feeling in my wrists and elbows and a sore back I realize that my body has limitations.  I can't always do it all. And yet, the work doesn't just make itself.  

I got into slip-casting last year when I had a master mold-maker make a mold of a bottle vase form that I'd been wheel-throwing and then altering for a while.  It was an investment to get someone else to make the molds for me, however, the molds that he made were... perfect.  With barely a seam to clean up, and with the prototype being exactly 12% (shrinkage rate) larger than my original, it was a good intro to slip-casting for me. 

I've been wrestling with the idea of making other molds, for instance,  making my mug designs into a mold, but I can't really get over the lack of throwing lines on the inside of my mugs that wouldn't be there in a molded mug.  There is something about holding a mug and seeing the hand of the maker and the process that I get all nostalgic about.  Being that I feel so strongly about the work of mine that would be handled the most staying the most hand-made, I decided to give some slip-casting on a 'mini-series' or a little grouping of vessel forms that are outside of my regular work a try.  

So here's the start of this process- I'm working on a little set of dishes for my kids- and most likely other kids out there once I work out the kinks.  A small plate/bowl/cup, all 1 part molds to keep things simple and stackeable.  The molds above are the handle and bowl, I'm working on the plate and then cup over the weekend.  The molds all have to dry out before I'll be able to tell if they worked, but it feels like a good place to start. 

 

About the process: I used a broken plastic sheet from a flourescent light as the forms around my mold. Basically I used clamps to keep it 'round' a plastic bat or base. You have to seal the seams with clay so the mold won't leak when you pour in the plaster, but the pattern of the plastic make your mold look real pretty!  This idea is great for 1 part molds but L shaped forms are best for 2 or more part molds.

To make 2 or more parts to a mold, you can use "Murphy's Oil Soap" brushed onto the plaster approx 3 times (letting layers dry in-between) so the plaster doesn't stick to itself.  I also cast an 'overhang' top- no technical terms here, but a portion that allows the slip to stay above the lip when I'm pouring it in.  I cut off the excess with that top part on and it allows my lip to be even and nice.

Researching Contemporary Ceramics

You might have noticed a lot of slip-cast ceramic images for various contemporary ceramic artist these days on my blog. I'm working on some designs for a collaborative slip-casting project with my good friend Disa, and in the process of my research I've been finding some really great work out there that I don't necessarily see on my usual design blog jaunts.  One thing I should say here is that I really enjoy doing a lot of research while I'm designing.  First off I think it's really imperative to know that your ideas are really your own, not just something that another artist is already doing.  It also is an important test of whether your work will hold up beside the work that's already out there. 

Anyways, here's the Dutch product/ceramic artist and designer, Ruth Lodder's work- which I think is really lovely.  It's interesting how she caught onto the trend of using 'found objects', in her case various jello molds, glasses, teacups, etc., then stacked them together to create her molds from.  Very clever and really lovely as you get all those references to classic shapes that are easily recognizable without being too simplistic!  The gold luster and patches of colour are also great- I'm always one to want to use colour to make my work my own and in her case, I think its stunning!

Breaking My Mold..

This past month I've embarked on a mold project with a 'master moldmaker' that has his studio down the street from me (I'd give you his website but he doesn't have one, contact me if you want details). Mold-making and slip casting is quite foreign to me- I am a potter at heart and have always loved making work on the wheel. Last year at this time I met Russell and thought about what it would mean to take some of my designs and make molds out of them so I could produce larger quantities without the same kind of physical labour that throwing involves. However, last year my ceramic studio was all of 190 square feet, and multiple molds take up space on cupboards. Furthermore the whole process of mixing up slip and pouring molds is really different than wheel-throwing and I really felt that my studio wasn't equiped for me to go down that road quite yet.
This year, I have a better idea of which designs I want to invest a mold into and I have the space to embark on this idea, so I took the plunge. Here's how it has looked over the past 2-3 weeks - step one being make a plaster mold 12% larger than the original (shrinkage rate), make lovely and perfectly sealed 2 part mold from plaster master model, part 3, the first pour. So we'll see how the rest turns out- with clay, the minute you change one core element, all the rest have to be considered. Here's hoping I can find a great slip recipe that goes with my current glazes!