Finally Filling Up the Studio

Well,  I have been busy and with 2 weeks to go I am finally filling up the studio.  I do have to glaze it all unfortunately.

The tunnel kiln is shut down until after thanksgiving, so I will try to have some of this ready then.  I do have a small wall set up with fired work, but have to work on it some more.  Elyse has come to help me in the studio and has given me hope that I can get it all done.

Elyse in the Studio!

The pieces are pretty rough and I decided that they should remain that way.  Ironically, the glaze really covers them and smooths the roughness, sort of like snow obscuring the hard sections of the landscape.  It is pretty liberating to leave in the mold lines and imperfections.  I love the cartoonish branches.

 These arrangements really remind me of taxidermy dioramas from local nature centers.  If you ever wonder what is inside these nature centers, it is taxidermy of all kinds. Driving from Sheboygan to De Pere twice a week and then sometimes to Appleton, seems to have influenced this work.  The landscape changing to fall and then winter seems to have sunk in.

Whenever I feel like I'm filling the space, I just have to look at this picture of Sunkoo laying out all his tiles before packing.  He has filled 8 crates!

Well,  I'm off to Appleton tomorrow after finishing up a few things.  Happy Thanksgiving.

Studio Works!

I've been busy in the studio and getting ready to go to Kohler in a week and a half.  I'm trying to finish my work for an upcoming exhibition before I leave, so it has been a bit crazy.  You can check out the show at ArtStart in Rhinelander, WI starting November 30th.  Here is some of the work in progress.

Many thanks to Reid Schoonover and Pat for the use of the shop and their help in making the forms.  It never would have been level without your help!  The cookies were great too.

This is one of two free standing wooden forms.  The bells will balance from this piece and I should have some working wall pieces put together soon to test out the balance. 

I hope to have about a hundred bells.  They are found bells from the thrift store, their hand made replicas and cast multiples.  Some of these are complete and strung together, but some are yet to be fired.

This image shows bits and pieces of three pieces.  I feel like a frantic making machine and then I have to slow down and focus on drawing for a while.  Most of the drawings are from old family photographs and take a lot of drawing and redrawing over and over.  The images overlap with those of strangers and everyday objects that have some significance to the past of my memory.

I've been thinking about the images a lot and in a way am getting to know them through the process of drawing.  When I was sifting through the photos, my daughter would ask me who they were and then would ask if they were dead.  The images are recreating an untouchable past in some way.

Then the images are drawn on the porcelain forms with pencil and after that with glaze pencil before they are glazed.  I have some finished test pieces and there are three others in the kiln right now, but I haven't seen them. 

The forms make the images permanent and the idea sort of reminds me of the daguerreotypes sometimes affixed to headstones from the past.  More to come as I get them finished.  Hope to complete most of this by the end of next week to allow for some breathing room.

Iowa Collaborative Exhibition at Mt Mercy

I have finally prepared the images from the exhibition at Mt Mercy University in Cedar Rapids, Iowa.  Craig and I are back in the studio preparing for exhibitions in November.

Topography, Gallery View

 We wanted to spread the flower and leaf forms throughout the gallery so that they became more of an environment and wanted to use a direct way of presenting them that wasn't too complicated. Craig and Andy set these up in the space leaving room for viewers to walk through them.

Topography, detail,  stoneware, wood, 2013

The wall installation, or Topography 2 includes hand pinched rods or leaves, objects and lattice like forms in porcelain.  When we were doing our residency in Alpena, MI, I was interested in the movement of the grasses and how they seemed to not only be different from moment to moment, but how they both hid and revealed other elements of the landscape.  The wetland was also surrounded by the city and the sounds of traffic or the glimpses of man made forms were ever present in the landscape as well.

Topography 2, porcelain, wood, copper wire, metal brackets, 2013

We toyed with different configurations for the installation and assemblage of this piece, but knew we wanted them to come out into space from the wall so that they could have subtle movement during the exhibition and that the shadows could become a part of the works themselves.

Topography 2, detail

This piece also allowed us to explore the idea of making something that is made from a series of forms anyone can make.  Although I've now gotten carried away with the cage-like forms.

We want to play around with the size and configuration of the piece, but right now there are four sections in the installation.

Marsh, is our series on the second wall.  They are forms containing cast found and natural images and pinched coils.

We are returning to Mt Mercy next week to give a lecture and photograph the work.  The block shapes below are made with the casting of natural forms we collected, mixed in with cast found objects.

 

The pieces are about the intersection of man and nature.

 

They are influenced by the marsh, the movement of the water and organic forms as well as the influence of the people on the land.  This is another piece that we are still playing with and hope to expand in a different configuration. 

We are also giving a talk about our work in the 2013 Wisconsin Triennial at the Madison Museum of Contemporary Art.  The talk is at 4:45pm, Monday, October 7th at Lawrence University, at the Wriston Art Center in the Wriston Auditorium, with a reception to follow.  Lawrence is in Appleton, Wisconsin. You can also check out the Events section of their site.  http://www.mmoca.org/2013-triennial/events

I hope to be able to update some more, but have been busy with school, Plato is up next, so I may be missing for a while.

Installing the Show!

This past weekend Craig, Hannah and I were in Cedar Rapids to install our show at Mt Mercy University.  Thanks to Andy and Heidi for all their help and hospitality.

Andy helping with the floor piece

The show is open now and though I wasn't able to take any finished photos, I have posted some                     installation shots. 

Thank you student workers!

There will be an Artist's Lecture at 4pm, October 11 and a Reception from 5-7pm the same evening at the Janalyn Hanson White Gallery at Mt Mercy.

These took up most of the time

Porcelain rods or 'leaves', cages and objects

The first in a set of 4

The work is up now and as soon as I get some finished images I will post them.  Thanks to everyone for their help.

Upcoming Studio Works and Other News

I have been running around all summer traveling, but am now back and ready post again.  Craig and I completed a residency in Alpena, Michigan at the Alpena Wildlife Sanctuary.  It was a great experience and many thanks to our wonderful hosts, Marcia and Avery as well as Karen and everyone else associated with the Sanctuary.                                                                                                                  

The Sanctuary is mostly wetlands and I have posted a few images from our many canoe outings

We have almost finished a body of work for our exhibition at Mt. Mercy University in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, inspired by our residency.

Here are some studio shots of our work this summer in preparation for the show and I will post more once the show is up.

These are our unfinished floor installation pieces that Craig has painted with underglaze.  When finished whey will be integrated with  wood bases.

 These are porcelain leaf forms or rods that will be strung together with wood and other objects like the cage forms below.

 These are part of larger clusters of repeating forms that bring together nature forms and found objects.

 This September Craig and I will be showing at the Wisconsin Triennial at the Madison Museum of Contemporary Art.  The show opens on September 20th.   Here is a blurb from their website about the show and the hours and days. Here is a detail of our piece.

Echo/ Mississippi

Widely regarded as the state’s most prestigious showcase of contemporary Wisconsin visual art, the Madison Museum of Contemporary Art’s Wisconsin Triennial returns September 21, 2013. The Triennial presents active Wisconsin artists and reflects a broad range of art representing current directions in contemporary visual art.

On September 20 at 6 pm, an opening night reception for the 2013 Wisconsin Triennial will be held as a part of an MMoCA Nights event. Join the artists and other art supporters at this celebration of Wisconsin contemporary art. Enjoy music, refreshments, and hors d'ouevres on the rooftop sculpture garden. Admission is free for museum members and is $10 for non-members.

We made this short video about our work together.  I think it is also available on MMOCA's website.

I will be posting more in the days to come before we head to Iowa. But I leave you with Midwest roadside attractions.........

 

 You have to love cement dinosaurs and man eating giant snakes!