where the process matters so much more;; part 2

continuation of my previous post ^^

out of the two branches of pottery, the branch of hand-building still appeals more to me. for throwing, all you do is bend over the wheel trying to steady your hands to shape the spinning clay. but the works are (usually) always just round, smooth and symmetrical. there is not much feeling in the process, its more of the work that perfectionists do. (to put it bluntly) although it is true that through throwing, people are able to create works that are of a more sophisticated, elegant and classy, i don't think that that is the main point of pottery.

as i have said in the previous post, the main point of attraction pottery holds for me is the process of creating a piece. it is the experience of molding and shaping the clay with your own hands to create a piece of art. i feel that throwing does not offer me the full experience of clay, but hand building does. in hand building, you are not restricted by the wobbling clay or the turns of a wheel. in hand building, you just have the lump of clay in front of you, and some tools and your two hands. to me, hand building offers so many more possibilities and opens up so much more potential in clay.

in hand building, you can physically shaped the clay, twist the clay and bend the clay however you like. and since it is "hand-made", there is little or no chance of replication, making each piece unique. and because of the high level of interaction between maker and clay, each piece is thus more personal and holds more sentimental value. there is also more opportunity for texture and designs in hand building, creating even more possibilities for the average lump of clay.

these are a few of my favourite hand-building works ;D the first two photos are different angles of a bull sculpture i made last year. it was made out of a picture in one of the books my teachers had lying around their studio and is one of the most realistic figurines i've ever made ;D just so you know it's made out of a single huge lump of clay that i shaped and carved out :D i emphasised more on the muscles and form of the bull as it crouches because i wanted to try and capture the power and strength the bull represents.

the next one is a basket i made by weaving clay coils together. the idea is simple but the effect is (in my opinion) really good, mostly because of the design and the colour combination. the glaze i used was so cool - brown when painted in less layers and blue in thicker layers. the effect with ultramarine was a lot more than i bargained for ^^

the last one is actually a candle holder. i posted it here not only because i liked it but because i thought it related to my coursework a lot :D there's a hole at the top of the owl's head where you put the candle in and there are rows of tiny holes in the belly for the light to shine out. owls are nocturnal creatures which always fascinated me because they live in a world that is mostly devoid of light. when i was young, i used to think that nocturnal animals had the ability to produce light or glow, which is how they live in such darkness. so i used that memory and made this candle holder - an owl that can glow :D

where the process matters so much more;; part 1

oh well in case you didn't know i've been taking pottery for about 7 years on and off but i only started throwing last year. here are a few pictures of my works ^^

for me, pottery has been a way to get away from the stress of everyday life. there is just something very therapeutic about sitting on a chair for hours on end watching a lump of clay shape itself into an artwork. in order to make pottery, you have to have the "work with whatever you've got" mindset, especially for throwing. Unless you're an experienced potter who can make exact replicas of vases or bowls, there is no way for you to predict what a little nudge will do to your work. neither is there a way to predict how the glaze will look, whether it will spread evenly, or it will flow down the sides. It is this level of unpredictability that I really like about pottery. That, and the fact that the process is always more important than the final.
For paintings, you look at the composition, the subject matter, the forms, the brushwork - in other words, you look at the final and how it looks, because that is the point of painting. but it is a different case for pottery. when you view a pottery piece, the main point is not the form, nor the colour. it is imagining how the potter made the work, how he made a sculpture like that, or how he made the vase curve that way. pottery is also a very personal thing, because only you know how the entire process from wedging to glazing goes about. only you can look at one of your works, and recall the memories of shaping and trimming, of colouring and polishing. it is this aspect of clay - that the process matters so much more - that holds the attraction for me.
these two bowls hold a special significance for me because they were the first ever pieces i made when i first started throwing. i especially like the one on the left, because of the colour combination i chose - stormy grey outside, and mother of pearl inside with shino beige for the rim. the grey flows down the side like rain and clouds, as though its really stormy grey and the whole feeling is just very subtley complementary C: you might guess from the pictures that i like to paint my pieces in glazes that flow, and you'd be right. i especially love the glaze mother of pearl - a runny glaze that appears transparent in less layers, and white in thicker ones. a good example of a use of this glaze would be the second picture. it's a pot painted in cobalt blue for the bottom half and liberal amounts of mother of pearl at the top. The result is that the mother of pearl flowed down the sides of the vase during firing, mixing attractively with the blue ^^ ever since then i have always liked the combination of white on dark blue. the third picture is a work that was more experimentative. i was actually inspired to try it when i saw one of my teacher's work - a slim vase with thin layers of colour running down on each other. so i decided to try it out by adding mother of pearl in between layers of colours to make them run and it worked! (sort of) :D the first picture is one of the few i have that doesn't have runny glazes. its the combination of a matt beige with a glossy clear brown. the effect is very simplistic and elegant in its simplicity c:

final. (FINALLY.)

finally! after one year, this is my final :D 4 trees, 4 candles, 4 choices. which is yours?

as far as all my trees go this has to be my favourite. its the spring tree, with new leaves just sprouting out, symbolising hope of new life, and hope for change, as the tree will not stop here but continue to grow leaves till it has a full crown. spring is a very hopeful season :) for farmers, it means the snow will melt and their plants will grow again, for people, it (usually) means a new year and new beginnings, for animals it means the coming of warmer weather. the birdhouse is the candle holder because spring is the time where birds return, after migrating before winter, symbolising the return of hope and life.

my comments: this tree was inspired by my spaghetti tree, except i blended the spaghetti together partially so that it looks a lot more realistic. the birdhouse was /supposed/ to be on the tree, but it fell off so i'm going to stick it back after everything is fired ^^ the red+grey oxide really came through when i was glazing the birdhouse. the brown that was created made the birdhouse look very woody and nice :D
summer. the hottest period of the year, but the favourite season of trees. in the summer, they are at their prime, with huge crowns of bright green leaves, soaking up the sun. the hot sun is the source of hope for the trees, as it promises food, light, warmth and life. also, for people seeking shade from the sweltering heat, the great crowns of the tree provide the perfect place to sit under and perhaps read a book, or swing from a branch.

my comments: don't look at it now, but the tree and all the rocks are actually not attached to each other. they (heh) sort of broke apart due to poor joining but its okay! it can be salvaged :D the thing i regret most about this sculpture is still not being able to shape the crown more realistically. (plus, i probably shouldn't have added so much oxide to it either ><)
autumn - the season of harvest. this is the season that farmers have been looking forward to all year, as it is finally the time they can reap the fruits of their harvest. not only do farmers hope for this season, trees do too. their fruits are finally grown and the seeds in them can be dispersed to grow into more trees. autumn is the season of hope of more food, harvest, and new life. so i thought it would be apt to let the object of all this hope - the fruit - be the main part of the sculpture, the place where the candle is placed. the apple symbolises fertility and new life. due to greek mythology, the apple is also associated with Aphrodite, and to throw an apple at someone was to symbolically declare one's love. not only so, the apple also plays a big part in the creation of life, as it was the forbidden fruit in the garden of eden.

my comments: the apple fell off again D:< but kay lah it was cause i hollowed the apple slantedly because the apple was going to lean on the tree so the "floor" that the candle is supposed to be on had to be parallel to the floor.. so as a result the c.g. went bazongkers and it couldn't stay on the tree >:
winter. the time of bitter cold and harsh snow. but even though times are bitter, hope is burning bright in everyone's hearts, providing them with the warmth and strength to survive the winter. a den is used as the place to hold the candle to emphasise on this point. animals like bears and foxes seek refuge from the cold in their warm dens, and hibernate throughout the winter, in hope of waking up to a warmer, greener place. by placing a candle in the den, i hoped to symbolise the hope that the animals and people hold in their hearts and minds, the hope that gives them the power and will to survive through winter.

my comments: haha i don't know why but this sculpture looked alot better when it wasn't painted >: but even though winter is supposed to be cold and harsh, its my favourite season (competing with autumn). there is just something so attractive about a scenery with the ground covered in sheets of white, and fluffy white flakes drifting down.. (kay fine i probably like winter because i'm been living in summer my whole life) but still ^^ I really like my den by the way. from behind it looks just like a big rock, which suits the natural feel of the sculpture ^^

tree try-outs! (real ones.)

this is my next trial after that failed one that broke. i realised that not only was that one too weak, it did not look realistic enough for my liking. so i tried using the spaghetti thing again and stuck them on layer by layer to slowly build the tree you see above :) its not very big.. probably just 15 cm at most.. but the tree looks //a lot// more realistic. but looking back, i realised that the knobbles in a tree aren't actually so prominent and... individually formed? its more of one shape made of different shapes. so i suppose i should have like took some slip and blended round the edges so the coils look more natural instead of.... a heap of spaghetti.
oh this is the crown of leaves for the summer tree! its hollow on the inside so a candle can go in and shine through the holes (: but i could have made the form more realistic i suppose but i forgot and left so it became dry and hard.. >:
this is the winter tree! see the big boulder-ey thing there its a cave where animals hibernate in the winter :) and its also where the candle goes ^^ i took this picture because i thought the tree looked really cute as though it was asking for a hug :D
this is the autumn tree! the apple is hollow (the hole's on the other side) to put the candle in. i'm so proud of the apple :D originally i just made the apple without the stalk or leaf and went around asking people what they though it was. all said it was an apple ^^ -happy- but the apple looked so nice i was quite sad to have to hollow it out >:

darkness is simply the absence of light;;

credits to xuedi for the title :D koped it off her blog~

anyway I made a mini version of my final sculpture! :D But it's not big.. Probably a few cm higher than a hand? It was basically just to let me get a feel of making trees out of clay and how I would make the trunk, the branches or the leaves. It was then that I decided on making the base out of rocks to add to the earthly naturalistic effect :) Through this sculpture I also intended to experiment with how I was going to integrate the candle holder into the tree. I tried my idea of putting it on the top of the tree here! I didn't know what to do with the branches so I just improvised with the spaghetti making tool.. sort of reminds me of avatar now.. The general effect was quite nice :D Like a nest built on a tree top ^^ very.... hopeful. Unfortunately.................
..................this happened. The coils for the trunk were too weak to support the candle holder and the spaghetti were unbelievably fragile (even more so after they dried). I suppose this could have been better thought out as to how the trunk should have been thicker, or how i should have hollowed more out of the candle holder to make it lighter, or how the candle holder could have been of a different shape to minimise clay usage and weight. But oh well~ it will be remembered~~ and plus it gave me new ideas as to the composition of the final sculptures ^^

the metamorphosis of stone.

it's fired! hurrah~ see the difference between painted and unpainted ^^ the painted one seriously look like rocks - therefore i am HAPPY. :D i haven't really touched oxides at all since the box thing in sec 1, and before that i've never ever used oxides before so using them now felt like trying to rediscover old territory ehehe. I'm really proud of this picture ^^ though the significance is actually in the memories that it bring up~ Glazing my finals gave me a totally new look on oxides since my impression of them in sec 1 was just that they were really monotonous and didn't give me many colours to play with - which is probably true if you used them on smooth pieces with not much texture.. But the oxides really impressed me with the way they just neatly flowed into all the nooks and crannies of the clay, darkening some areas and lightening in others. it's ability to be sponged off also helped greatly in adding tonal value to my sculptures :D

Below is a picture of how i turn a white, fired, irregular lump of clay (bottom left) into a rock :D adding grey oxide first (top left) gets the glaze into all the little cracks and dents in the clay while it just slops thinly over smoother surfaces, and this effect works even better if you just slop the oxide on with the brush and let it kinda roll down the sides. oxide = tonal magic<3 i originally had all my rocks look like just step 2, but i decided to try and experiment on a rock and slop some diluted red+grey oxide (top right) and the effect was so good. red+grey somehow equals a really nice rustic brown that made the rocks look more organic and natural, as though the rock had been sitting in soil for years and the colour of the earth sort of diffused into it :D but then it became a bit too dark and there was not enough contrast between the lighter and darker parts for my liking so i sponged it, letting the sponge just clean away any part of the rock it could reach, getting a nice natural highlight for the final rock (bottom right) ^^ the lighter parts of the rock became a light red cause of the oxide but its fine. it adds to the rustic feel ^^

sculptures~~

Looking for possible inspiration for a tree sculpture :D

THIS ONE IS SO FREAKING CUTE. and its so easy to make too! but it looks so classy~ like you could put it on one of the side tables in a posh hotel's reception lobby or something :D kay back to topic back to topic~ this sculpture is interesting cuz because it looks like a tree in shape [or at least a bush.. thing] but in colours and way it is glazed, it looks sort of like a flower :D but it strikes me as a sort of mutilated flower D: like the brown bits are where its injured and bleeding and the green is the life/flesh in it O:

verdict: interesting to make as a side thing when i'm bored ^^
ooh thisthisthis. its like made out of windchimes but i think its all glued and fixed together. which is sad D: cuz windchimes are like supposed to be free to swing and knock into each other as the wind blows to make pretty chimes<3>

verdict: interesting ideas given~
oh this one has an apple!! like the tree of knowledge and wisdom in the garden of eden. i sort of want my tree to be like the TOKW so i wanted an apple there too but didn't really know how to attach it on.. this one is like attached to this small stalk which will DEFINITELY be too weak to support a clay apple if the clay is still wet. hum. maybe hollow the apple out to make it lighter? or like wait for it to be fired separately then super glue it on?

verdict: food for thought ^^
oh i put this here cuz it like completely ties in with what i wanted my tree to portray. see my idea is to like have a hugeee tree of life supporting a pandora's box similar to how atlas is supporting the world.

verdict: nice hands, but DEFINITELY not making a human figure.
ahhh this one. i put it here cuz of the outlines of the world that atlas is holding up. it makes me want to put the box inside ^^ also, i like the angle the photographer took of this statue, looking at it from a bottom up view making it seem more gigantic and towering and like majestic. he also captured the entire length of the building from this angle which increases the level of... majesticity and makes it have a "infinite potential~" feeling ^^

verdict: angle!!! i love what photography can do to a sculpture :D