Breadth: Carved Pumpkin

This was a very different process.  When working with the pumpkin, I had to wok very fast so it would not get old.  It was difficult because we were working on it with the lights on.  It was card to determine how much we have carved off without a light in it.

Ceramic Purse

This it m favorite project.  I was entered into the Lisa show with this piece and I also won a blue ribbon and a purchase award at the North Suburban conference.  I was very proud of this piece and think this is my best.  I got to create a zipper again and creating the leather texture was very entertaining.  Like most of my pieces, the clay must be rolled out very thin.  I had a lot of breakage on this piece but in the end it turned out great.

Ceramic Boot

When trying to represent movement in clay, the clay has to be very thin.  This makes the clay susceptible to breakage.  While working on this piece, I had to make sure the clay was moist, otherwise it would crack.  My favorite but most difficult part of making this boot, was making the zipper.  I had to really understand how a zipper worked in order to create it.  The finished product was very realistic because of my attention to detail on the zipper.

    

Breadth: Nature Bird

For one of our breadth pieces, we did nature artwork.  I thought it would be neat to make a bird of of nature.  I formed a bird out of clay, and used it as a model to form this bird out of wood chips.  I collected cups of wood chips and picked out which ones would be useful for the body form.  As I was adding wood chips to form the wings, I realized it needed a more feathery texture.  I used helicopter leaves for the wings, and twigs for the feet.  I enjoyed this project because I got to use a different material besides clay.

Ceramic Baseball Cap

My inspiration was an old hat in my closet.  Like most of my other pieces, I thought the movement in the hat was very unique and interesting.  To go along with my portfolio, most people would never think of this old and dirty hat as an interesting subject for artwork, but I saw something different. I had to mimick the stitching on the cap, and this was a difficult process.  It was hard to get the lines deep enough so it would be noticed once covered in iron oxide. Overall, I am very pleased with this project. 

Ceramic Soccerball

After completing the ceramic shoe, I found an old soccer ball in my backyard.  i thought it was interesting how it was deflated.  I decided I would recreate it in clay.  The form was hard to make because the clay could not be too soft because it would not take shape.  It also couldn't be too hard, because then it would not be easy to manipulate.  Once the shape was done, I had to outline the shapes to make it recognizable as a soccer ball.   This was a very difficult process.  I printed out the shapes, but when I would trace them on, it would never match up.  With this predicament, I had to hand draw the shapes on ball. 

Breadth: Teapot

This assignment was to make a teapot using an artist as inspiration.  I chose Rene Magritte as my inspiration for this teapot.  Magritte uses apples as a subject in many of his paintings.  I enjoyed painting the colors on this apple teapot.  I had never painted on ceramic before and I really liked the experience.