Here I am exhibiting in a mixed art and craft fair in Chipping Campden, in the heart of the picturesque region of the Cotswolds.
So as well as chatting to the visitors about my methods and techniques, I was also looking at my work as a whole and feeling the need for a bit of a change. I'm not unhappy with what I've been making, but sometimes (as my mother would often say) 'a change is as good as a rest'.
So first off, Alan offered to make significant changes to my website and get all my work bang up to date. I love it, and you can take a look here.
And in the workshop during these past few weeks, this is more of what I'm going for -
More naked clay and less glaze. The decoration is a velvet underglaze.
I then progressed on to this -
A thrown stoneware cup with great dollops of porcelain smeared on.
This is a Japanese cup called a Yunomi. Although deliberately made misshapen, as if not wheel thrown, it should still give the impression of being made with skilled hands. So I'm prodding and squeezing all over the place and somehow it's really freed me up. It's like going back to that beginner stage again, where everything is new and exciting.
I've put aside the glossy glazes for a while and dug out a matt one that I haven't opened up for some time. I applied it with thick and quick brush strokes, as on these stoneware buttons.
And I've dirtied up my pristine white porcelain brooches by mixing in some black clay. The cutter I used for this I bought in the cake-making department of a local store.
And finally, from an old ceiling light fitting that I came across in our junk room ...
I rubbed on a thin coating of Vaseline, lay stoneware clay over it, and I've just put this together with a wheel thrown foot -
I heartily recommend going for some changes to give yourself a rest!
HAPPY POTTING FOLKS.
