Working on fish bowls.

It was a beautiful day in the garden and I was very tempted to take the day off. However, pots are drying fast and I am behind with my work. ( As you can see I've protected the rim of the bowl with cling film to stop it drying too fast).
I am working on a series of bowls with fish on them. These are fun to do. I have a few books with pictures of fish which I work from and just draw directly onto the leather hard clay. It's a wonderful feeling drawing into the clay as there is still quite a bit of 'give' in the clay so it feels soft when you draw. There is very little planning so it's quite an immediate process. I felt a bit like a school child with a new colouring book.

Glazing!

 We had a glorious week-end walking on Dartmoor. When I returned to the pottery on Tuesday I found that I had almost no clay. A very sorry state for a potter. It did mean that I had to settle down and do some very over due glazing. In fact the pottery was grid locked with work.
The pictures above are very poor pictures but they show some of the work out of the kiln this morning.
Natural history is becoming an important element in my work. We get a wonderful range of birds in our garden and I am beginning to think I need a much better camera to get pictures that |I can work from rather than using books.
Just to prove I was in Devon I am including two photos from a village we visited. Can anyone name the village? I thought these railings were very unusual. One of the walks included trekking up to 10 tors! So I returned quite exhausted. Anyway I have since made a trip to 'The Clay Cellar' and restocked with clay. Although I have enjoyed all the slab building it was great to get back on the wheel.

Birds and bees

This is a reliquary I finished today. At the moment the lid looks a little big but that is just because the bottom has been shrinking. Most of this set are decorated with birds and bees.
I've been thinking that I need to work on my drawing skills so I've joined a life drawing class. It's ages since I've done anything like this and many of the others in the group are very young. They are all working on huge sheets of paper with charcoal and I am working on A3 paper with ordinary pencils and trying to get very precise ,accurate lines. I went to see the Lucian Freud exhibition a few weeks ago and it made me feel like giving up. It was breathtaking, most wonderful.
At the moment I have some work in Red Barn Gallery in Cumbria. It's a long way to go so I haven't been there myself but it looks like a wonderful place to spend an afternoon as they also have a great looking garden centre.
I'm off to Devon for the week-end on a walking holiday. I'm not looking forward to the walk but I am sure there must be some potteries near. We are staying vaguely near Dunsford if anyone knows which potteries are near!

Friday's work

 I finished this box on Friday. I had hoped that I would finish another one but working out the design proved to be time consuming and so I didn't finish the second. Although I've worked on drawings in my sketch pad they don't match the scale of the pot so I've had to rework them to fit.
Gradually the window end of my studio is becoming a drawing area. I think I will need to re think this when I need to do some glazing.

Slab building

 The weather was so pleasant yesterday morning that instead of going straight out to the studio we went for a walk. Although the walk wasn't far from our house we had never done quite the same route before. The blue mosaics form the ceiling of the monument above. The bluebells were a wonderful intense blue.

At the moment I am working on some slab built 'reliquaries'. This one is very similar to the one I made for myself recently but I thought I'd start with this to progress to some slightly different ideas I want to work on. Sometimes it's easier to work up to something than to jump straight in.

A new shape

I've just finished a run of small tureens so I thought before I got onto the next batch of work I'd experiment with a different shape. I think this is a bit too tall but I will probably explore the idea a bit more when I can find the time. I am just wondering if the shape isn't quite right for slipware! However it does provide a good surface for decoration. ( Is there a 'right ' shape for slipware?)

When it goes wrong.

I've been working on these small tureens today and yesterday. I thought I had a good idea to make some ladles to go with them. Unfortunately they didn't survive being dipped into the slip. They are probably just not a very good shape for slipping so it's time to re-think that process. I still like the idea but obviously need to go about it a different way!