MudStuffing Sketchbook

Yep, I’ve been a bad blogger this summer. Too much warm weather, too much fun with my family, lots of pots and all of a sudden summer is almost over… but not it’s not over yet! The family is headed to Jamaica next week and we cannot wait! We went 2 years ago, and fell in love with the island and it’s beautiful people. We debated going someplace different, and the more we kept looking, the more we all kept wanting to go back. So next week, Gina and I will celebrate 15 years together and we can’t think of a better place to be. But you came here to read about clay, not jerk chicken and red stripes.

I’ve been getting some encouraging feedback from the sculptures I’ve been doing this year, both from other artists whose opinions I value, not to mention selling a few can really motivate. I still had issues with cracking, probably due to my work schedule more than anything, but I thought I’d mix up a batch of reclaim with some various grogs and nylon fiber. I started on a few small pieces and then a larger bust. Unfortunately the clay with the fiber does it’s job too well. I can’t slice it half to hollow it out… hell… I can’t even cut it without the fibers clogging the knife. So, the piece below will never see the light of a kiln most likely. I suppose the nylon would be best to use in slab/coil construction method. Just another case where I think a change in materials will fix my lack of discipline I guess.

Reclaimed stoneware with nylon. Iron rich backyard terra sig slip.

Detail

Month of May 2010? where the heck are you headed? I was just getting to know you and all of a sudden you tell me you’re almost over? It started with helping Michael Kline stoke his kiln (I gottsa blog post stored in my head about that, but may soon be irrelevant), my birthday, LEAF festival to see Ozomatli with the family, followed the next week by firing my own kiln (another blog post I need to get out of my head). Before the kiln even had a chance to cool, I had to go to Seattle for some work, 8 days out west, some substantial poker winnings (for me anyways ;-), and back to NC to unload a kiln (ok I just partially unloaded it, I had a wholesale order of mugs that needed decaling ASAP, so I cherry picked them without even unstacking the shelves… the kiln is still not completely unloaded, and no kiln blues… hmmm coincidence, or maybe it was just a good firing). Sold one of my new sculptures on Etsy (sweet!), found $5 in my shorts pocket, and saw Michael Franti with Gina at the Orange Peel this past Monday (Gina patted him on the shoulder, and strangely, she hasn’t washed her hands since).

But all of that is nothing compared to Dodo Farts. If you make the pottery blog rounds, you may have seen mention of a little trade I made with Mr. Kyle Houser, who I pretty much consider the godfather of decals. Homefry was decaling his wood fired soda pots when I was still in diapers (or at least when I was just experimenting with them during my pre-soda era), and I am always on the hunt for a little gem from him and trying to learn everything his pots can teach me. This trade was no dissappointment. His mug was waiting for me when I got back from Seattle, and I’ve been using it for morning coffee since. Yeah, I am just like a rock and roll groupy, I won’t be washing that mug until I get a nice stain going on in that shino crackle. Thank you kind sir!

I’m posting these in a sort of chronilogical order of when they were made, even though they were all fired together, I think there is a natural progression. So this one, American Wonder, was done right after the one I posted yesterday. I think you can tell I was more concerned with getting something anatomically correct, rather than mucking about.  And yes, I didn’t sound too excited yesterday when describing these busts. Maybe I wasn’t too excited about “Warm”, but I am/was pretty dang excited about this one. Sure, there is some room for self analysis and improvement, despite having  some eyelashes  missing in one eye (broke off in boneware state), and there is a crack in her shoulder (dang cracks!), I am pretty excited about how “American Wonder” came out. Glazed pretty much the same way that “Warm” was… craftrobo stencils with colored slips and underglazes, bisqued, then a iron oxide wash, clear cone 6 glaze + sprayed cone 6 commercial glazes, then a cone 04 decal firing. Everything is electric. The clay body is loafers glory (a white stoneware), not the greatest sculpture clay, but it’s what I use for my pots so it’s what was on hand.

So, I am on a roll, three days in a row I managed to get my 12 x 12 in. Today I threw some plates and bowls and then headed to run some errands. Dropped off some steel at Biltmore Steel, got $20, I then went and spent it on some veggie plants, and then off to my ‘not so secret’ stash of free wood. I use two “types” of wood in my kiln. I suppose purists are more concerned with the biological type of wood for their kiln, my concern is mainly size of cut. I like using cut up pallet wood for my primary fuel. I also need thin ‘edge cuts’ to help me get through stalls or really boost temp. When the kiln is at cone 8 or higher, these thin pieces of wood pretty much explode in the fire box, releasing their energy in quick bursts. I didn’t use any of these edge cuts in the last firing, and found out just how important they are in order to get the kiln to cone 10/11 in 10 hours.

Anyways, there’s a mill within 10 miles of my house, and it’s any wood firing potter’s dream… normally they have huge 14 foot bundles of this wood, bound with steel straps, and will drop it in the back of my truck with a fork lift. I drive home, bind it up with tie downs and chainsaw it into 2 1/2 foot pieces. One huge bundle plus a truck load of palletts in usually all I need for one firing, usually with some to spare.

So today I get there, and they tell me someone already has ‘dibbs’ on the wood.

“On all of it?”, theres usually 5-6 bundles stacked up outside.

“We only have one bundle left. You’ll have to talk to the manager.”

So I do… and he tells me the pottery department at UNCA has dibbs on the last bundle. “Another potter showed up here 4 weeks ago with 3 vehicles and took 4 bundles. Someone from Penland was here before that”.

“Wow…”

I know there is a lot of potters in North Carolina, and especially in Western Carolina. We probably have a higher percentage of potters per square foot than anywhere else. I guess I just didn’t realize just how many were firing with wood and how much wood we are actually using.

I hope no one knows where I get my pallets from lol! (and no, it’s not the one in in Asheville city limits), cause you know I heard rumors of a pallet kiln just down the road

We are standing next to saw and there’s two bins of edge scraps in them. “You think I could just have these?” Luckily, he let me take what was in the bins and had someone bind them and drop them in the back of the truck. I was pretty lucky I decided to start on my fuel early for this next firing - usually I start 2 weeks before, right about the time I start glazing.

So the hunt begins for a back up source of edge cuts. If Penland is coming this far south (we are on the far side of Asheville from there), then I am wasting my time looking north. Pretty soon you know I’ll be driving as far as South Carolina, and as I drive down I26 I’ll be thinking… you know propane is sounding pretty sweet right now.

Skull Study, originally uploaded by mudstuffing.

Hope your holidays were great, I’ve been purposely absent both online and in the studio, spending a little quality ‘real’ time around the holidays….

My brothers and sisters pitched in together to get my mom Philippe Faraut’s DVD series on sculpting. It’s an excellent series, and I highly recommend it. Not hat my mom really needs it, she’s a fine sculptor in her own right, but defintely has some tips and great information on anatomy and facial expressions. We previewed while at her house and I think all three of us (my little brother Dave, mom and me) were itching to get our hands on some clay to put some of this new found knowledge to use.

I decided since I had never haven’t drawn much anatomy since college, and all of that was drawing based (not 3d) I’d start with a study of the skull. I’m digging the results. I’m away in Seattle for next week, so no clay for me, but when I get back, I’ll hollow this out, start on something new, and bust out a bunch of orders I’ve been procrastinating on… I am usually creatively drained after the holidays for some reason and the last few weeks have been nothing but food, family, and a little poker. Now I am itching to getting back to producing and experimenting with new stuff.

Here’s the link the the DVD series if you are interested.

http://ceramicartsdaily.org/bookstore/dvd/the-art-of-sculpting-by-philippe-faraut-3-volume-set/