During the summer, well, before that really, I had begun trying to Hand Build some of my own pottery. I tried, and tried. I had a few interesting pieces, but honestly, most of it ended up in the recycle bucket.
During the summer, when two of my boys were taking some college classes, I had a thought that I could take a class or two and develop those skills that I was desperate for. So I did it. I enrolled at my local community college and am taking a Ceramics class! This is the first time that I have been in a college class since 1989. Damn! That’s a long time.
Anyway, it’s been a blast getting to play with clay and be around like minded people. Well, people that share the same interest, ceramics, as I do. I’ve got a couple of friends in the class and have made some interesting things. A couple of pinch pots, a coil pot (it looks an awful lot like Oogie Boogie from A Nightmare before Christmas) and a couple of stamps. Next week we have a paper due on an artist from our textbook and I’m looking forward to having 20 year olds critique my writing style. Yeah, I can’t wait for that.
We’ll be starting glazes, like making your own glazes, next week as well as starting to learn how to throw on a wheel. I am looking forward to that. It is something that I have never done, and while I have no idea if I can, I’m willing to give it the old college try. Lol. I am looking for the perfect cobalt blue and, if I play my cards right, I hope that by the time the class is ending that I will be able to make the prefect tea pot and create a one of a kind glaze for it. Even more so, I can’t wait to try Raku and see what develops (lol) from there.
Yes, this is a new chapter in my life and I am excited for it!
Today’s project: We have an assignment in class to make a ceramic speaker that we can put our phone or iPods into to amplify the sound. I have no idea when it’s due, but I decided to begin on it here at home. I wanted to do this fairy thing, but this is what I ended up with. It’s totally non-functional, which is a first for me. It’s going to take days to dry, but I’m crossing my fingers that I won’t have any breakage and that it will fire well. What it is, that’s for you to determine. And the yellow thing is there to hold it up while it drys. It will not be a permanent part of the sculpt.