I won the fellowship!

I just found out on Thursday during lunch, that I won one of the Maine Arts Teachers Fellowships! This fellowship is awarded to only 8 arts (visual art, music, dance, theatre) teachers in Maine per year. I started the application way back in November when my very good friend and artist Shanna Wheelock told me I should apply for it. She teaches art in Lubec and won one of the fellowships in 2007. The whole point of the fellowship (which is awarded through the Maine Alliance for Arts Education) is help arts teachers take their own personal art to the next level, thereby giving them a boost of creative energy so they will become more effective teachers in the classroom. Makes sense doesn't it? I have always believed that art teachers must be artists first and teachers second.

I have been itching to try encaustics (the art of applying molten wax paints onto surfaces) for years, but have lacked the instruction to do it safely and the funds to start up. Let's just say that it can cost over $1000 just to buy the heating supplies and basic paint colors for this medium. I asked for almost $3900 ($4000 was the limit) to pay for a workshop on encaustics at Maine College of Art, a mentorship with artist Kim Bernard, encaustics supplies and paints, travel expenses to Kim's studio, and childcare! They are paying for childcare! How awesome is this?! I plan on using the new knowledge I will gain through the workshop and the mentorship with Kim Bernard, to make a series of clay sculptures this summer. I'm actually going to have enough money for once to buy all the supplies I need without feeling guilty. Plus, I've asked for a total of 17 days of childcare spread out over May and the whole summer. So freakin' exciting!

In other news, my square plates came out....interesting. Only one came out good (actually outstanding) and it already sold! The other two had disappointing side effects. One of them sagged in the firing and touched the kiln shelf, resulting in some kiln wash stuck to it. I can grind it off, but it will have a blemish on the bottom. The other one sagged too, but when I picked it up, it actually snapped off one of the corners. Trash can! But, I am not too upset as this is a learning experience for me. I may have to try some supports in the firing process. I must think think think.... I must not be mad because of my good news mentioned above. Here are some photos showing my really nice 8" plate that came out. The third photo shows the blemish on the bottom of the plate, blah!

New Glaze Tests

I did a cone 6 firing last week and experimented with some new glazes. I've always just fired to cone 4 because I found a couple great base glazes over a decade ago and just configured my own colorant and oxide amounts to add to them. But, over time I am discovering that cone 4 is very limiting. There are hundreds of cone 6 glazes out there that I've been itching to try. It takes hours to do though, something I don't have a lot of. I bought "Mastering Cone 6 Glazes" by John Hesselberth and Ron Roy, glazing gurus. A very good read with loads of great info. I realized that I've been loading my kiln so that it's not firing evenly. With just a little more work and watching the kiln more closely, my firings are coming out better.

Down below are the three test tiles that I'm most pumped about. Raspberry, Bone and Spearmint. The Bone looks more whiteish in the book, but I like the warm variation I got here. I can always experiment with the amount of rutile in that one. I'm sooooo excited about the Raspberry and cannot believe I actually weighed out the components correctly on my tiny little kitchen scale that I've owned forever. One measurement called for .2 grams of green chrome oxide! If you put even .1 gram more, you can get a disgusting green color instead of red. And the Spearmint just looks so yummy.

Happy Easter!

This is my daughter showing off her ceramic pattern egg that she made in her Kindergarten class with me. I took a couple afternoons off from teaching my Kindergarten classes......to teaching her K class. Not a big switch for me, but I never get a chance to volunteer, so this was fun for me. I feel weird teaching holiday projects, but I introduced it as a "pattern egg". The kids didn't care and had so much fun anyways. Even if some of them don't celebrate Easter (which I know a few don't), they experienced a making a sculpture rich in art elements: pattern, line, shape. Below are all the eggs from the class. I love how they are all different in pattern and color, just the all kids are!

New Pendants

I've made some new multi-colored pendants measuring approx. 7/8"width by 1 and 1/8"tall, with just over 1/8"thickness. I've already sold 3! This week has been really good to me with local and word of mouth sales. I've sold 5 pendants just this week alone.

Broken Dryer and Making Square Plates

Our dryer broke this weekend. The heat just stopped working. We've tried fixing it and have had zero luck. It's old, so time to replace! But, until Uncle Sam sends us some $, this is what you'll see around my house.

This is what I'm working on right now in the studio: square plates. I'm having so much fun making them. So different for me to handbuild functional ware. My sculptures almost always have slab work, but never have I tried this. I love rolling slab and throwing them. I don't have a slab roller, but I think I do pretty well at getting even thickness. I'm trying 12" squares. With the 11% shrinkage, I'm looking at approx 11" width. I'm also working on smaller 9"plates that will shrink to about 8" in the end. The little plate pictured is a test. I want to make sushi pottery too!

New Pendants and Etsy Maine Team meeting!

These are two of my newest pendants. I have been experimenting with different textures and combinations of glazes. I love the way they are coming out. I just need to make more at this point.

I love this plate. Right now I'm experimenting with square shaped plates that can be interchanged with my thrown pieces.

Tomorrow is our first Etsy Maine Team meeting! http://www.etsy.com/profile.php?user_id=5647553 I hope the weather holds out for us. We were supposed to have our first meeting last weekend, but I had to cancel it because of the horrible weather. I was so bummed. I'm really looking forward to making some new artistic and crafty friends and of course to network. I've made some great trades too, although some of my key trading buddies can't make it tomorrow.

Now I just hope my kids will feel better soon! My son has an ear infection and my daughter is fighting something nasty. Spring can't come soon enough.