Face bulbs from Summer 2020/Spring 2021

face bulb, I particularly like the texture that happened on the tongue

At the end of spring I finally glazed and fired a batch of face bulbs that I had made last summer. These face bulbs are (in my mind) related to both my scream/face mugs and the protest/resist bulbs I was working on in 2018. 

installed face bulb group in my studio

 

The academic year, which last year meant moving my studio classes online for the first time, and my AFT faculty union work, meant that I didn't have a ton of time in my studio in summer 2020 because I spent so much time on union stuff.

masked face bulb

I was able to finish these in Spring 2021, in part becacuse I was teaching classes that had moved online in fall/winter and because my teaching schedule is irregular, leaving me with an overload in fall and winter and a slightly lighter load in spring.

here the weeds coming out of the mouth are meant to be a metaphor for toxic or hateful speech

I wasn't able to get good pictures of these in May, though, because I couldn't figure out how to set them up in my photo booth. They are designed to hang on the wall, so I needed to wait until I had a wall available.

the temporary wall of bulbs in my studio for the tour

If that part of the house weren't being remodeled, I probably would have hung these up in the laundry room/hallway where I've had a wall set up for bulbs like this ever since my home was the the Larson Gallery's Tour of Artist Homes and Studios in 2013. 

hand on face bulb (sold)

This wall was unavailable for most of the summer as my husband was remodeling and repainting first the laundry room, then the hallway, and now he's moved on to the stairway. 

I don't remember if this was actually based on 45, but the expression seems familiar 

During the Yakima Artist's Studio Tour over Labor day, I set up my temporary walls in the studio and in the yard. These temporary walls were made for a show I did at Yakima Makers' Space (now the Collab Coffee space) in 2017. 

temporary wall installed on the fence in the yard

Hanging these temporary walls on the slightly open drawers of my work table in my studio and over the fence in the yard worked really well. And I was finally able to get some photos of these hanging like they are supposed to.

too much shine :-( but this one is modeled on a colleague's face

I probably need to work on getting some photos of the work hung up and with better lighting. The dark and glossy pieces in particular didn't photograph as well as they might have because I just used the room lighting.

again, weeds from the mouth

The light colored bulbs look better, but they could do with some intentional lighting and maybe the use of a tripod.

bulbs on the wall (detail)

I could theoretically take care of this now, since I have yet to put one of my walls away, but over the last two weeks I've been sucked into the melee that is the start of the quarter and convocation. 

back on campus, I've really only had one student who has trouble keeping the mask covering the nose

I've been really busy. This quarter I am converting my 100% in-person throwing class to a hybrid class with 2 hours of the week entirely online. I've also been converting the handbuilding class I've taught online this past year into a hybrid class, which is more work than you realize. 

I kind of want to fill the mouth with something

It seems like the conversion to online should be the hard part and the conversion back to campus should be easy, but it requires reconfiguring basically the whole class, including adjusting projects so as to take advantage of the shared space and tools, but also basically every online page and assignment has to be adjusted to remove references to the challenges of working at home, bringing work in to be fired, and how to contact the instructor.

using this form for heads makes such a funny pointy shaped head

Both classes have the added challenge this quarter of needing to adjust to accomodate the new 3' social distancing guidelines we need to observe in the studio. Keeping the student's work spaces and wheels 3' apart isn't particularly difficult (nor is it new), but keeping myself 3' away at all time while showing them tools and techniques and checking what they are working on is tough.

more bulbs on the wall together

The start of the quarter also encompasses a lot of faculty union work. We've had meetings and discussions with our membership, administration, and quite a few different work groups on special topics. 

the matte texture photographed failry well

One of our goals this year/quarter is to spread some of the work around to more people so that the workload that falls on my shoulders is reduced. But it even takes work to shift that load. People are stepping up admirably, but there's a lot of information share in my notes and my brain that they need to be successful, so these past few weeks have had a lot of focus on getting folks to where they can take over.

This one hangs a little to the side, like he's yelling at his neighbor

And, of course, everyone has those same start-of-quarter work loads. The union work is incredibly valuable, but all of us do it on top of our full-time jobs, which just makes busy times busier.

in the studio,

This post feels like it will be the last post of my work for Summer 2021. This is a bittersweet time of year, knowing I have to set this work aside for a while. I haven't even finished putting away work from the labor day tour and finding the time to do so is a bit of a challenge.

again, trying to express the nastiness of current political speech

I also know that I had quite a few more posts planned of student work from my online design and handbuilding classes of the past year. Those posts take a bit more effort as I need to check names and permission to share student work as I write them. Posts about my work only require that I take the pictures sometime and then write whatever I'm thinking about. As time allows, I do plan to add those student posts this year.

I don't have 30 face bulbs, so the rest of the wall was abstract and politics bulbs

The sadness of not getting to do my own work during the school year is tempered greatly this year by the fact that I will get to see my potters and hand-builders and their work in person. Both classes started this past week. Though being back on campus was more exhausting than I anticipated, I think the first week back (especially after 18 months) was always going to be especially exhausting. Going into next week, I am really excited to see what they are able to produce.

New Face Mugs from August

 

some of the face mugs at the Tour

Last weekend at the Yakima Artist's Studio Tour, I showed (and shared pictures of) my most recent batch of screaming face mugs. But I never got around to sharing pictures of them here on my blog.

Orange and red scream mug

I made 11 new mugs this summer for this show. I started and finished them all in August, along with some other functional work, and only pulled the finished pieces out of the kiln the week before the show, as I was setting up.

some of the face mugs ready to come out of the last bisque firing

The mugs all fired successfully and the glazes did what I wanted them to do. I think some of the faces are more striking than others, and some ended up being my favorites or less favorites.

wet clay roughed-in for the face on this mug

I remembered to take some in-progress photos of the mugs from wheel to sculpting to glazing to finished. Some of them look completely amateur while they are in progress. I actually get a kick out of taking photos at this stage.

this blue on blue face mug is the finished version of the rough one above

They can also look like a bit of a mess while I'm glazing, as can my work space. I like to make the colors bright and unrealistic, but I also like to make the color combinations more complex to highlight the indents and textures of the faces.

first layer of glaze on the faces before being wiped away

What that means is that at one point I have painted the first layer of color over the faces and they just look like the person glazing is bad at painting.

green on red screaming face

I had some color combinations in mind that I wanted to replicate (and avoid) from my earlier mugs, but I was doing a whole bunch of glazing at once, monitoring the levels of each glaze I had on hand, and trying to pay attention to a few other things, so I lost track sometimes of which colors I planned to do more of.

green on green (or possibly blue) scream mug

The result was that I used less red than intended and more green. A few of the blue and green faces have less contrast between the first and second layers of glazes.

first layer of glaze wiped away from the faces to highlight texture

After the first layer of glaze dried, I wiped away the glaze like I do with my top underglaze layers in textured sculptures. At this point the faces photograph pretty well, especially with the darker colors and from a distance.

blue on blue mask mug

I then apply a semi-transparent glaze over the entire piece, covering the darker highlight layer of glaze. In the firing, the darker color will show through, though it becomes invisible before it goes into the kiln.

glazing in progress, interiors and first layer exterior done

Underglazes change tone and texture during firing, but generally don't change color much. So I can often gauge basically what the color combination will look like after firing and I can see how the colors layer, as long as my first coats are thick enough.

green on green scream mug with crooked eyes

Because the colorants, fluxes, and other materials in the glazes react to the heat of the kiln, the colors of the glazed but unfired work don't really reflect what we will see after the firing.

fully glazed face mugs ready for firing

The color change can be a challenge for beginning potters to learn, since glazes that look pink in the jar or the bucket might turn out blue or red or transparent.

My nose is not connected to my respiratory system face mug

This was a pretty good kiln load for me. It was probably helped along by the mistakes and practice pieces that I fired earlier in the summer or last year, and the results of this firing will help me choose and avoid certain glazes and combinations next time I fire.

fired face mugs, bowl, and mini vases

I expected to like the green over red, and it is one of my favorite color combinations, but I was pleasantly surprised by the orange over red and the orange over blue.

orange on red scream mug (with raised eyes)

The mugs themselves were thrown on the same day, using basically the same amount of clay, but I neither weighed the clay nor measured the height or width of the cups. I like the variation in heights and widths, but I also noticed some variation in width near the top. 

orange on blue scream mug

While most of the mugs have straight walls, one is shorter and a bit wider than the others and flares very slightly from the bottom to the top. The white glaze inside this one brightens the interior further. I think this particular mug feels like the kind of mug that makes you slow down, or the kind that has room on top for foam art.

wide green on red scream mug

I was a bit surprised that I didn't sell more of these mugs during the tour. I'm actually wondering if some people were thinking they'd be able to contact me later to purchase items closer to the holidays. Lots of people talked about, laughed at, and reacted to the mugs. 

scream mugs on display for the Tour

My studio was very clean for the tour and I had lots of work out in the studio. I hid my packing materials, my tools, my clay, and my mess for the show, but as soon as I start working in the studio again (sometime after the busy start of the quarter, as I am transitioning to teaching on campus this quarter!), I will bring out all the mess (because I'll need the tools and clay and works in progress).

Very early stages of a scream mug

I have already started putting away some of the items, including everything from the lawn and much of the functional work besides the mugs. The other day I had to take out some of my citrus squeezers because someone wanted to buy one. Luckily the combination of cleaning for the show and my husband's partly finished hallway remodel allowed me to pack these items away more carefully than I did after the Fresh Air Art Festival, so It was easy to find the box and unpack it.

green on green and blue on green scream mugs

I also plan to bring some of these pieces to Oak Hollow Gallery in the next week or so and have them available for the holiday season. I plan to bring some scream mugs, bowls, mini pots, and maybe some of the citrus squeezers if they want them.

scream mug in progress

Yakima Artist's Studio Tour Recap 2021

"Big SRAM" sculpture on my wedging table

This past weekend was the first annual Yakima Artist's Studio Tour. My house was one of 7 on the tour. I've been advertising it heavily here and on social media for the last few weeks.

sculpture set up above and around the small photo booth in my studio

The event went fairly well, considering the smoke and the covid and this being the first year. I had about 100 people come through over 3 days. That estimate is pretty rough, since we didn't start counting until 1:30 on Saturday. We tried to just reconstruct who had been here during the busy midday.

Dezignosaur display for my daughter and her friends

This was the first year of what we plan to make an annual event. There was some confusion from some visitors about whether this was the same or different from the event Larson Gallery used to do, the Tour of Artist's Homes and Studios, which I participated in way back in 2013, but I think that confusion had little impact on whether folks wanted to attend. It was interesting to listen to people describe the Larson Gallery's Tour. One person was complaining that it was always the same artists; I think they may have been thinking of June Art Fest. 

Face bulbs, new work as of May 2021

As I type this, I realize that these three events seems very different in my mind (different times, locations, prices and artists), but they probably seem pretty similar to someone who isn't focused on the differences. Probably a bit like how I view all the wine/beer related events around here that I never attend. I don't spend much time thinking about the difference between Fresh Hop Ale and Spring Barrel events--and couldn't tell you off-hand when or where either event would be. 

the Dezignosaur girls finishing their last pieces the night before the show

Besides being the first year of the show, this year's tour was challenged by the spike in COVID cases and the smoky weather from the forest fires. We're hoping at least one of these situations will be changed next year. Though I also realize that exactly one year ago we were talking about how "next year" we'll certainly be through with COVID.

masking and covid, we're all getting tired of it

We had a fairly steady stream of visitors to the studio all day on Saturday. I only knew a few people, but everyone was pleasant and almost everyone knew how to wear a mask. 

is this how we wear masks? no?

I posted a sign, but the vast majority of people came wearing masks already or had them ready to put on. I think one person forgot and we gave them a mask. 

the sign for masking in my studio

On Sunday people came in bursts. For a long time at the start no one showed up. It was lovely weather outside, so I read my book in the shade in the yard. But then a bunch of people came all at once. Sunday's attendance was like that all day, lulls followed by bursts where there were so many people I could barely talk to them all. 

the Dezignosaur girls at the show

Monday was a short day, just 10-12, but I think it was nice to give people a chance to get to a studio they missed or revisit one to buy something they liked the first day. We didn't have many people on Monday, but those who came mostly bought something, which was nice.

sad, tired face mug

Honestly one of the nice things about this year's inaugural show was that it forced me to thoroughly clean my studio and unpack or uncover some work that had been put away after a show or during our renovations.

face bulbs, new as of May 2021

I had never gotten a chance to display this set of face bulbs, even though I had fired them in early May. I didn't have a wall available for taking photos. For this show I got down my temporary walls from a show at Yakima Maker's Space in 2017. I was able to display wall work without hammering into my new drywall and I was able to cover up my clay storage with the temporary wall.

my portable bulb wall blocks my clay storage (and hangs on my drawers)

The temporary wall in the studio hung over the front edge of the drawers on my main work table. The other hung over the fence. Both of them have cleats in the back that were a very nice fit for this setup and easy to move and hang.

second portable bulb wall on the fence

People generally didn't want to walk all the way across the lawn to see the one hanging on the fence, so next time I might have to set up some sort of path or enticement to walk over there.

signage directing people away from the front door

Since my whole house wasn't open, I had set up signs and a path of lawn sticks and balloons in the side yard to guide people from the sidewalk along the side yard to the studio entrance. 

balloon and stick path

I lined the walkway with balloons, which mostly meant that we spent the entire weekend listening to balloons pop in the sun. In person (though not in photographs), the lawn sticks and sculptures made it pretty clear where the pathway was and the balloons were probably unnecessary except for the kids.

sculpture lined path to the studio

It was nice to see my studio totally clean. In fact, one day I was talking to a man for 10 minutes when he asked to see my studio. He was standing next to my wheel. Apparently the studio looked so clean and unused that it wasn't even recognizable as such.

finished work on display on my ware shelves and wheel

I also like how colorful the studio is with all the work on display. Now, the next day, the studio doesn't look so much like a showroom or gallery. I started putting stuff away so that I'll eventually be able to use the space again. I have a list of things I want to work on, once I get time.  Classes start in two weeks, and I need to get ready, but cleaning and taking work out and setting up for the show reminded me of a number of projects I want to work on, finish, try out, redo, or explore.

Video tour of the studio tour this past weekend (no audio)