Slab Slump Mold
Planning: I wanted to make my slab slump mole into my historical piece. I went out to the patio and found a dish that I liked and could use as a slump mole. It needed a flat surface in the bottom or on the walls so that I could paint my historically inspired image into it.
Firing ticket:
Construction Process:
I covered the mold in a plastic bag so that the clay would not stick to it. I rolled out a slab of clay using the slab roller. I then cut out a piece for the base and a piece for the side walls. I put the base on, and then cut in the angles on the edges on both pieces, and scored and slipped them and put them together. I smoothed it all out, and let it harden a little so that I could take it out of the mold, and continue to smooth and even it out. I then glazed it with an image of a tree, and a camel, and two pyramids in blackness in front of a sunset in the desert.
Reflection:
This piece came out well, I really liked how the underglaze colors in the background blended together, and then the contrast with the black for the shadow look of the details of the pyrimids and the tree and the camel. I probably could have done more coats of glaze all around, but the coverage is still better than some of my other pieces.
Sgrafito
Planning:
I wanted to make another dart mug because I liked making it for the dart project, and I thought it would be cool to try to sgrafifto a landscape into a mug.
Firing ticket:
Construction Process:
I rolled out a slab, and built a slab dart mug. I then tried to do make a fancy handle for the mugg, and rolled out two long coils, and wrapped them around each other to form a spiral Handel, and attached it to the mug. After spending time smoothing it all out, I underglazed it , and then carved in the image. After letting that be fired for the first time, I clear glazed it and let if fire for the final time.
Reflection:
I rushed the building process and the sgraffito, I should have spent more time on this piece. The cutouts from the cylinder that turn it into a mug were not evenly sized which made the whole mug look sloppy. I also should have practiced what I was carving because I did not do a good job at making trees for the first half of the cup. The sgraffito also came out with sharp edges, and was not smoothed out . So after being fired the carving is feelable under the glaze. The coating of glaze was pretty good, it came out even and the coverage was good.
Coil Building
Planning:
I practiced making the different styles of coils, and thought through the order I wanted to make the bowl in.
Firing ticket:
Construction Process:
I used a small extruder to push out the coils to build with.I started it with a big basic spiral coil for the bottom, and then attached smaller spiral coils as the bottom of the sides of the bowl. I then used long coil pieces to make three layers of normal coils, and then on top of that attached a braid coil for the top layer of the sides of the bowl. I then put in foot for the bowl to stand up on using four little balls of clay put together that look like a little flower. I then underglazed it with two different shades of blue in attempts to make an ombres.
Reflection:
The braided coil was really difficult to make, especially to make it long enough to go all the way around the bowl. It kept breaking and getting too dry, and I had to keep attaching new coil strands to the ones that were breaking off. I also don’t think that I constructed it very well, and did not score and slip all of the pieces together enough. It ended up breaking apart and crumbling when it dried out waiting for the kiln. I slob bucket the piece. It probably would have fallen apart when getting fired anyway.
Slab Building Darts
Planning:
I needed to make a dart slab mug, so I decided to keep the design simple so that I could focus on the construction of the dart process. I found inspiration from Pinterest for the color layers and I wanted to try it out.
Firing ticket:
Construction Process:
I attached the handle after forming the mug, and spend a while making it all super smooth. I glazed it in color layers. Starting with the color that showed on the top, covering the whole thing, and working my way down exposing the new colors as I worked my way down.
Reflection:
I really liked how the construction of the dart mug turned out, I felt very proud of it. I weirdly thought to attach the handle to the top and inside of the cup lip, and later realized that that was not normal, but it still ended up looking fine because i smoothed it out enough.I should have done more glaze coars in the lighter colors, because the light blue was kind of transparent slightly, and was showing the orange through it a little bit. Overall i think this piece was a very big success as my first dart piece. I would make it bigger next time I make a mug this way.
Semester 1 Final Project:
Planning:
After I found this piece, I thought of a way that I could make the piece 3D , and sketched it out so that I could figure out the proportion of sizing for the wings with the body.
Firing ticket:
Construction process:
The construction process for this piece was not too difficult, but I wanted to be very careful and detailed. I rolled out a slab on the machine and cut it out into circle. I molded a ball of wedged clay into the body of the dragon fly, and then used more pieces of the rolled out slab to cut into the 4 wings, and the tail. I carved into the wings to form a feather like feeling out of carvings on all of the separate pieces. I then attached the bottom wings on both sides by scoring and slipping and smoothing out. Then I added the top wings half on top of the bottom wings, and propped them up with pencils so they would dry at a different level, hovering over the bottom wings. I carved into the body and added the beak onto the head. I kept adding details by carving out of the clay. I fired the piece, and then glazed it. The glaze I used were brown and off white/ cream colored. I covered the entire thing in the cream, and then went over all the details that are carved into the piece in the brown tone to make them more defined.
Reflection:
I really enjoyed creating this piece. It started off looking really weird and in a bunch of pieces, and then as I connected it all it really started to come together and look really cool. I think if I thought it through more and had a little more time to work on then i could have done even more engraving details to make it look more realistic. I then covered the entire piece in glaze, and painted over the carved out details in a brown tone to made it more noticeable and look more like the actual piece.
Final Project Write up:
Who the master artist was:
My master artist is Leonardo Da Vinci
Time era:
Da Vinci was was a prominent person during the High Renaissance time period. He Lived during the late 1400’s and early 1500’s.
Training:
Da Vinci was knows as a renaissance man, because he did everything. He was an activist, a painter, a droughtsman, and engineer, a scientist, a theorist, a sculptor, and an architect. He was trained as a painter and a sculptor in the workshop of Andrea del verrocchino. He received the usual education of the time in his house from his father for elementary education. He became an apprentice learning painting sculpting, architecture, and acquiring mechanical and technical skills.
Impact on the art world:
Da Vinci had a unique perspective and experience with scientific observation from his background in both and and science. His most knows piece was the Mona Lisa which had a big influence on the art world due to the use of sfumato technique; which blurs and softens the edges of the painting that gives the piece a sence of depth and realism that has influenced many other artists. He also held a great importance on other aspects of the world in this time period due to his inventions along side his art work; as he was also a well recognized inventor of the time.
Why this artist?
I chose Da Vinci as my artist because he has always been an artist that I remember a lot. I had personally seen the Mona Lisa up close when I visited France years ago, and so having a connection to such an impactful artist from so long ago through getting to see his work in person makes him standout to me. I also really like his diagram sketches and drawings because it is a very interesting way of combining science with art. Such as his drawing of the proportions of a man, which is very similar to the piece I picked for my project of the proportions of the humming bird he made.
