of textures and Terra sig...

Lots has been going on. I had a great audition last week for "Lion in Winter" but wasn't cast anyway. I must not look 61 ;) that's all I'm saying on that right now. The last two weeks or so, I've been having trouble with people messing with my pottery on my shelf in studio. Not really malicious messing, but messing nonetheless. That is, I've come into studio to find my pots that were on my shelf covered up where no one should have come into contact with them, uncovered and pinched in. The neck of a bottle was grabbed and squeezed enought to have hand prints indented into the clay. The vase the following week had similar finger marks at the lip. Both of these were more or less fixable, but the point is, I shouldn't have to fix them. #1 rule over at the theatre, IF IT'S NOT YOURS DON'T TOUCH IT!!!! Some other people need to know about that one too.

Anyway, I picked up my Art that I purchased back earlier in the summer. The show finally came down. I love it, although I'm still not sure where it is being hung in my house, it's in the living room right now. The new shows that were hung in it's place at the Arts Center, had their opening on Friday night. The Art runs the gamut from watercolor to whirleygigs, photographic to abstract. The opening included a reunion style dinner with chicken done several different ways, collards, green beans, rolls, sweet potatoes, and of course dessert. After dinner was the premier of the Signature Dance Company. They did a 30 or so minute piece in homage to the artist of the biggest show that was opening. (the abstract stuff) I know 4 of the six dancers, have taken classes with two of them, and the other two work at the arts center, and some of them helped choreograph "Wizard of Oz" for us back at the first of the year. I'd seen just seconds of dance from the company here and there, so I really had no idea what to expect for this, and let me tell you, they blew me away! The piece was fantastic!! The emotion that poured from their youngest member alone, who is 18, was incredible! We're very fortunate to have them as a part of our arts community.

One of the other shows which opened friday is from ceramic artist, Kathy Triplett, who is known for her tile work as well as her teapots. I spent the weekend in a workshop with her. Most of my recent pottery work as you know, have been wheel thrown pieces, and what you may not know, is I tend to strive for a really smooth surface. Kathy's workshop was all about handbuilding, and texture. A definate departure from what I have been working on. But part of what I like about knitting is the textures, so it isn't a foreign concept to me at all.

Saturday was mostly about making different textred tiles. We did some mugs and handles too. Today was mostly about glaze and Terra sigillata finishing techniques. We used most of the techniques on our tiles that we had made yesterday, and I got some great ideas for some future projects...possibly even some to try on raku, which our first firing for this session is Wednesday. (we're having two firings this time, since the class is so large, and so many don't know what the process entails.) the tiles won't be fired for at least a week probably, so we'll have to wait on the results, but we had some great starts to them. I'm looking forward to the results.

No photos this time, as I only took photos of Kathy and her work, and didn't ask permission to post them, but you can go to her website which I linked above to get an idea about her work, although they are even more amazing in person. Come back later for photos of my work from this amazing workshop.