Toolympics

I was happily using one of my favorite clay tools recently and started composing a blogpost solely for it. And I guess because the Olympics just ended I thought about giving it a gold medal. And then I started thinking of other good tools I have, and figured I would round the whole idea out with bronze and silver too.



So, here we go. The Bronze goes to the hand-held Wire Cutter, which is not only useful for turning your big chunk into many little chunks, but also is indispensable for getting your finished pieces off the wheelhead. Honorable mention goes to the wire cutter attached to the wedging table at a 45 degree angle. Because when you are faced with a 25-pound cube of clay, there is no cleaner, better way to dissect it.






Silver goes to this Wood Modeling Tool I may have picked out of the lost and found, but has proved itself to be perfect in so many situations. I use it when I want to clean up the base of my thrown pieces before cutting them off the wheel, and also find it extremely useful as a modeling tool when attaching handles. I have used it so much in fact that it is starting to wear down to a perilously fragile point and I was never able to read the name of the company that produced it, only faintly impressed on the side, and thus haven't been able to buy any replacements.




Gold goes to the Fettling Knife! Oh, fettling knife. You might try to cut through a clay slab with an xacto or a plastic butter knife, but I think really, the fettling knife has the best dimensions for the job, with its slim, long blade that is sharp, but not overly sharp. Its narrow rounded tip can get into corners where most modeling tools can't, and if you have a glaze drip, this is the best thing to shave it off. I even keep one around the house to open the mail.




There are so many ingenious tools out there to help artists work with clay, now I am sorry for the ones I've left out (sorry, tools!). But while tools by definition are specialized for certain uses, it seems I have a particular admiration for tools that are reliable doing multiple jobs. Like Olympic All-Around gymnast Mary Lou Retton. Or Decathlete Bruce Jenner. The Fettling Knife is like the Bruce Jenner of clay tools.

Wintry Mix

Happy New Year and happy winter! I am emerging from a post-Holidays hiatus. A light, dry snow fell yesterday. I like how when it first started snowing the wind blew it into wispy, whiskery streaks along the street.

And how it created a halo glow around this piece of string.

The last snow here in Philadelphia was in December- we got a crazy 23 inches or something. I had to go to A Very Kensington Christmas at Greensgrow Farms the next day, and I woke up early to dig out the car, got stuck trying to drive closer to my house to load up, but eventually, finally, made it. However, I was one of the only ones to do so that day.

I had been at this event the previous weekend, though, and it was great! A Very Kensington Christmas is InLiquid's holiday sale at Greensgrow Farms, a really cool urban farm and nursery in the Kensington neighborhood in Philadelphia. People were coming by throughout the day to pick up their CSA share, Christmas trees and wreaths, and shopping at our tables for gifts.

Greensgrow was also selling soups and-- get this-- chestnuts! which were actually roasted on an open fire! I could not resist. Have you ever had one? They can be difficult to open, especially when they are charred, the leather skins get brittle. Then there is a furry layer which is funny and soft, but it tastes bitter so you need to pick that away as well. And then, if your chestnut hasn't crumbled apart by this point, you have a brainy-textured nugget that tastes sweet and roasty, with a powdery and creamy texture that ends up melting in your mouth.

From Scratch Market

Snowday Ceramics had a table this past weekend at the From Scratch Market held at the Trexlertown Grange near Allentown. Credit goes to Pam Parker for a nicely organized event. I'd never spent much time in the Lehigh Valley before so I did not know what to expect, but ended up having a lovely day.

My table was located on the main hall of the Grange, with about 30 other artists and vendors of all kinds of handmade goods. I made friends with the other potter in the show, Pia Somerlock, who has her studio in the Poconos and has been doing this for about 10 years. She makes a wide variety of stuff including stoneware pots that are earthy on the outside, and brightly glazed on the inside. She will be at the Reading Public Museum "Art of the Craft" show next weekend.

I also chatted for a while with Melanie Linder, who has banded with a group of women from the Kutztown area to form Z-Town Made, an artist collective. A lot of their work seemed to be influenced by Pennsylvania Dutch folk art, but with a design-y freshness that is totally appealing. Maybe they are showing how design-y Pennsylvania Dutch folk art actually is. I ended up buying one of Melanie's prints.

A band called My Cousin The Emperor (I think?) played on the Grange stage, keeping the energy up throughout the day. There was also some very tasty food being sold downstairs, including a delicious butternut squash soup with fresh bread.

Speaking of food, after the show was over and I packed everything up, a source recommended I stop by Yocco's -The Hot Dog King, a local landmark fast food place. So I got pierogies, hotdog, and a birch beer before getting onto the Turnpike. Happy endings.

Cupcakes for Claymobile

If you will be in Old City this coming First Friday, surely you would like to stop by The Clay Studio at 2nd & Race Streets where the Claymobile, The Clay Studio's educational outreach program, will be having a BAKE SALE to raise funds for the Claymobile's programs.

The Clay Studio will also be holding their opening for exhibits by John Utgaard, graduate students, and one of my previous instructors and friend, Shawn Spangler.

Hush Cups

The Clay Studio is celebrating its 35th Anniversary on October 10th with a big event throughout the whole building (they are tenting the parking lot too!) that includes live music, BBQ, and silent auction. I have donated a pair of Hush Cups to the silent auction. These are small cups thrown on the wheel, and altered by my thumbs and fingers pushing out or into the cups' sides. I had been meaning to create a kind of puffy, cloudlike vessel, which they sort of are, but even more than that I like how they appear to hold something just below the surface, a suggestion that is not entirely revealed.

The Silent Auction will be on view at The Clay Studio starting October 2nd through the 10th. I think the auction will also be accessible online and will post that information when I have it. Read more about the 35th Birthday Bash here.

**UPDATE**
to view auction items or bid online, go to the 35th Birthday link on The Clay Studio's website and scroll down to the Silent Auction link, or just click here, where you can browse all the artists, search by artist, and register to be able to bid on the auction. Bidding closes at 8:30pm on Saturday, October 10th.

Pulling Triggers: A work in progress

Here is a project I have been working on for the past few months: someone put me in touch with a fellow who needs some cups made for his wife. She has rheumatoid arthritis, so she has a specific mug that is comfortable for her to hold, based on things such as the size, weight, placement and size of the handles. This is a photo of one of her own mugs on the left. I am told that Bennington Potters in Vermont makes this style of mug, and it is often referred to as a Bennington Trigger.

But inevitably, cups break, and her supply of these are running low.


Her husband asked me to make some more for her. "It has to fit her like a glove," he told me. I said I'd give it a shot.



I finished a batch and sent them to her to try out. They returned with her user feedback on little stickies. For example:






So I have made another set, trying to get the size and hole placement right on target, and we shall see how it feels.

It is cool to have a project like this, which not only makes my degree in industrial design seem relevant but also gets me to throw many pots.

I also am learning to appreciate how difficult daily life is--just holding a coffee cup-- for someone with rheumatoid arthritis.

Octomug

My friend Rachel commissioned me to make an octopus-themed mug for her husband's Father's Day gift (Happy Father's Day, Eric!). Though I probably would never have thought to make anything like this on my own, I am quite happy with how it turned out, and discovered fascinating facts about octopuses in the process.

For example, an octopus has no skeleton so it can squeeze through a tiny opening, or even a skinny, hairpinny tube in order to get to some food at the other end. An octopus can figure out how to unscrew a jar in order to get to a crab sealed inside. Check out this You Tube video:





There was a large aquarium where dogfish shark carcasses kept appearing at the bottom of the tank, and when they put cameras in to figure out what was going on, they discovered that a giant pacific octopus was doing them in.

On the other hand, even though octopuses can be very strong and very fast, they run out of energy quickly because of their poor circulation.

I also found a cool octopus jewelry shop on Etsy at Octopusme.etsy.com






The suction cups are fun to touch and I think I will try adding little bumpers like these to some other mugs.

My Burning Question For You

One of the most helpful ideas I got from Julia Galloway's workshop (previous post) is that the point of making art is to explore and celebrate. This might have been a notion I vaguely understood in the back of my head, but thinking about what I learned from the workshop really crystallized it for me.

So I have been trying to organize my own work and process within this idea: what do I want to explore and celebrate through the making of pottery? What am I already exploring?


I think one theme I have definitely been trying to understand in my work is that of Comfort.

My years at art school majoring in industrial design compels me to gather data from the world outside my head. I mean, I have ideas of what comfort is, but maybe I really have no idea what comfort is. So I am going to ask everyone out there to explain comfort. Please leave a comment below or send me a message here. Tell me one word, or five words, or an anecdote, or send me an image that describes comfort for you.

I think Maggie here has figured out what comfort is!