Well the new year is starting with more handbuilding. As my last fishing lady/boat had a serious crack on the rim, I needed to make another one. Unfortunately, even with the old one as a model, the new one does not seem to have the same pleasing proportions. It bulges out too much so distorts the frontal view. As well using 7 ladder rungs instead of 5 seems to add too many and does not look as "right" as just the 5. However it will give me glazing practice.
One of my more successful pieces from the December firing has been the mirror. It didn't warp as much as I thought that it would. So will work on some more mirrors at those should be a more readily saleable item than the fishing lady vases- as everybody asks what are those for? What do you do with them?
I also decided to do a social commentary one - a child with a balloon on the front and then the back - his companion has shot him/her. My husband's comment was why do you want to show that? Also the shooter does not look evil.
But that is just the point. It is often the ordinary person who ends up committing an act of violence. We hear so often of senseless attacks/murders especially where children are concerned, acts that are impossible to comprehend, the attacker remembered as an ordinary person. So this is my attempt to highlight this issue. Should be fun glazing - I can do some red for the blood.
There is a call for entries for Eastern Ontario craftspeople for a show by the Ontario Crafts Council and am not sure what to enter. In case none of my more recent sculptural forms come out, I am reworking an older piece that consisted of 4 egg cups (one egg cup has an egg in it) on a firebrick. I need to replace the real egg and make a porcelain one. I am also handbuilt a "firebrick" with the words GAIA stamped on the side.
This piece is called "Our Fragile Earth" and represents the interaction of the biological world (the woodpeckers) and our industrialized society(the brick) with the physical environment. The woodpecker chippings refer to the damage that we are doing to our planet (as represented by the one egg - we have only one earth). The words GAIA refers to James Lovelock's theory of GAIA - that the earth is a series of self regulating systems much like a living organism and when one system is damaged or unbalanced it will affect eventually the entire planet. According to Lovelock by the year 2040 the earths regulating systems will be irrevocably damaged resulting in extensive habitat and human destruction. So not sure if people looking at this piece will see all of that.
No comments:
Post a Comment