Black and Blue

Yesterday afternoon the sky was so beautiful with the sun behind the clouds. The edge of the clouds were white as could be back-lit that way. Sometimes sharp contrasts make the eye take notice.

Day before yesterday I was watering the landscape beds. As I was walking to the back garage door I tripped on the wet step and I fell against the stoop. Luckily I didn't break anything, but I have this huge black and blue bruise on my hip. The bruise is about eight inches long and three inches wide. Yikes, I don't think I've ever seen a bruise that big. At least not a bruise on me. Today I am really sore in more places than just my hip.

 A couple of days ago I thought my studio closet was getting rather messy, so I straightened it up a bit. It's amazing how much stuff (tools) one can amass working in clay.

I hope to get to some clay work today, unfortunately other duties have pulled me away. I want to make more bargello towers, work on circle baskets, and a few other pieces. Thanks for reading and for all your comments.

I Didn't Mean It Nice

Yesterday I brought some clothes I'm no longer wearing to the local thrift store. While I was in the store I looked for used canvases to purchase so I could paint on them for my painting class but I didn't find any. I quickly looked through the household goods to see if I could find any slump or hump molds. I saw a beautifully shaped, low and wide wooden bowl for a dollar and decided to purchase it. It was smooth and  about ten inches across and had a flat bottom. I was thinking I wish I could make a ceramic bowl as nice as this shape.

When I got up to the counter one woman had a whole cart full, grocery cart size, of foreign made Christmas mugs she was buying and the clerk had already started to ring her up. The woman behind her had a whole cart, grocery cart size, full of clothes and various other items piled up over the top. Normally I'd just wait, but I had told Gary, who was waiting in the car, that I'd just be a minute. He hates to go in the thrift stores and gets impatient if he was to wait too long. Since we only have one car right now I don't get to the thrift stores that often. I put a dollar in the wooden bowl and set it on the counter hoping another clerk would come or the woman in front of me would suggest I could go before her. I waited while the clerk wrapped up each mug for the previous woman one by one, put them in a bag, and then in her cart. I was thinking all those foreign made Christmas mugs would probably be sold at the flea market this winter for a dollar each and she was buying them for twenty five cents each. I was thinking if I had any mugs I made I wouldn't be able to sell them.

The woman in front of me glanced around and noticed my one wooden bowl with the dollar in the bowl sitting on the counter. Finally the first woman pushed her cart full of mugs out of the store and the woman in front of me pushed her cart full of clothes piled up high to the register. At that point I stepped out of my norm and decided to ask the woman in front of me if she minded if I went before her because I only had one item. She turned and looked at me and said "I don't have that much in my cart". I glanced at her cart and said OK. Right then another clerk came up to the counter and asked if I had exact change. I said I didn't know what the tax on one dollar would be. She said six cents. I didn't have exact change but I had a quarter and a penny. I gave her the dollar and a quarter and a penny and told her to keep the change. She said you don't  have to do that. I said consider it a donation or a tip. I walked out the store and as I left I told the woman in front of me to have a nice day. I didn't say it mean, but I didn't mean it nice. I feel bad about that. Thanks for reading and for all your comments.

Bargello

Many years ago I did needlepoint, petit point, and bargello. This bright greenware tower reminds me of a bargello pattern. The tower is about 15 x 6 x 3 and is made with stacked strips of clay. Although I didn't intend for it to look like bargello I like the effect. I'd like to explore more of these colors in a more traditional way with gradations of the same or similar colors. I have some touch up to do on the underglaze because when I moved the piece to the drying cabinet I smeared some of the colors. This post is part of the Mud Colony what's happening in the studio. Thanks for reading and for all your comments.

Process and Development

Yesterday I mentioned a few ideas were percolating in my mind. I thought I'd show you glimpse into my process and development behind the scenes. Here's some initial work on a couple of my ideas. The circle bowl or basket came to my mind's eye, so I decided to make it. I have a few more of these open bowl or basket shapes in my mind's eye. This one won't even be fired because the circle shapes ended up uneven which wasn't what I had in mind. That and I don't think the seams are going to hold, but it's a start. Many of the pieces I work on never show up on the blog or make it to the kiln. Still others are fired  and sitting in the cabinet waiting for further development, but have only been seen my me.

This piece developed without an idea or shape in my mind at all. I happened to cut the wavy strips in a slab but not all the way to the top. Then the idea popped into my head to try and form the whole together into an enclosed form. There is no bottom or top. As I looked at the form it reminded me of a grass skirt I might have seen in Hawaii as a kid. I could also envision a top to the form in a vague human shape. I also thought of adding a tray under the bottom but I like the curved up bottom and wouldn't want to obscure that from the eye. I'll be working on these thoughts and ideas.

Next I tried adding handles to the top of a similar form. Not sure about this, maybe just a single handle across the top. Although this form reminds me of a skirt being held up with suspenders. Ha. In order to come up with something feasible or acceptable to my mind's eye I sometimes work on several forms intuitively. Later many of the forms are tossed out, completely rejected. Sometimes these intuitive workings lead to something and other times not. Some of these ideas may stimulate me to develop another form. I might not think of the new form if I didn't make the attempt at the rejected forms. What about your process and development, how do you work. Do you draw an idea first, do you work intuitively, do you reject forms or ideas about surface treatment. Thanks for reading and for all  your comments.

Percolating

The following pieces found new homes over the last couple of weeks.

Thanks so much to my collectors and followers.

Meanwhile I have several new ideas percolating in my head. You know how I am about pottery ideas. Remember those electric percolators? You know a coffee percolator (image borrowed from the net). My mom had one of those when I was small and I loved to hear that sound and watch the coffee bubbling up in the small glass knob.

Seems to me before the electric one she had one which went on the stove, an aluminum one. I guess they still make percolators. I use a drip coffee maker with paper filters, the brown, non bleached filters. I grind my beans each time. I have reduced my intake to one cup per day down from two. I also have a French press type of coffee filter around here somewhere. How about you? Do you drink coffee? What kind of coffee maker do you use? Thanks for reading and for all your comments.

Ceramic Baker Oven Poached Pompano

An Environmental Ceramics Inc. fish baker designed and manufactured by Taylor and Ng circa mid 1970s was used for this recipe. Win Ng was a Chinese American sculptor, industrial designer, and illustrator whose early career focused on abstract work influenced by Peter Voulkos. He is best known for opening Environmental Ceramics which manufactured pottery sold in the department store Taylor and Ng he co-founded with Spaulding Taylor.

 The interior is glazed, exterior is unglazed, there is a small hole in tail for steam to escape.

I started with one whole cleaned pompano 1 1/2 pound fish and cooked shrimp to stuff interior. Shelly of Shelly's Seafood in Homosassa suggested I try pompano this week. What a good recommendation, thanks so much.

 Place shrimp in fish cavity and drizzle with Vietnamese garlic and red chili sauce.

 Chop one shallot, half cup or more of cilantro, one inch square of ginger, and juice two limes.

 Place stuffed pompano in ceramic fish baker.

Add one cup dry white wine, lime juice, and cilantro, ginger, and shallots sprinkled over the top. Put cover on fish baker and place in cold oven and set temp to 400 F, cook for 25 minutes. Immediately remove from oven.

Here is cooked pompano fish.

 Remove pompano from baking dish and reserve liquid in fish baker.

Remove shrimp stuffing and set aside, and peel skin from fish if desired. Skin is paper thin on pompano fish and little to no scales are present.

The BEST FISH I ever ate. Pompano is a mild buttery flavored white fleshed fish. I placed fish on plate with some of the shrimp stuffing, some rice and drizzled with juices from fish cooker, and a few black olives. The juices were superb drizzled over the top. There is one of these vintage cookers on Etsy (not my listing), if you love fish, get it and use it. You won't be disappointed using it. Thanks for reading and for all your comments.

Getting High

Here's my cat Butter getting high. You see he has a motive for getting high; he has a nice view out the window.

All of a sudden Butter has been sneezing and sneezing and I'm wondering if he has inhaled a bug or something. He's an indoor cat, although he does go on the front screened porch most days for an hour or less. Why do these things always happen on the weekends when a trip to the vet will be an emergency and cost more?  Thanks for reading and for all your comments.

Midas Touch

This is a rose from my last garden called Midas Touch, a fragrant hybrid tea rose. It truly does have that soft look of gold. The name of this rose made me recall King Midas from Greek mythology who had the ability to turn everything he touched into gold. This became known as the the touch of gold or the Midas Touch.

King Midas later came to regret the wish he was granted. Legend had it that he turned his daughter to gold after touching her. When he touched food growing in his garden everything turned to gold. King Midas purportedly starved to death because he couldn't eat gold food.

In 1957 the University of Pennsylvania unearthed a tomb in Turkey supposedly that of King Midas and discovered the largest cache of Iron Age drinking vessels. Here are some examples of styles of drinking vessels they would have unearthed. Above is a drinking cup called a kylix.

This is an eye-cup; as you can see the side of the vessel shows the two eyes.

This is a patera, a broad shallow dish for drinking. I know I'd be spilling a lot. 

Here is a kantharos an ancient Greek drinking vessel with two pronounced handles.

Sometimes kantharos had small, medium, or tall stems.

The rhyton is a drinking vessel shaped like a horn and usually ends in a figure representing a stylized animal or shell.

Rhyton were used for ritual drinking ceremonies and during Roman table games.

Here are examples of olpe, pitcher or ewer, for pouring liquids.

This is an oenochoe or wine carrying jug. All images were borrowed from various sources on the net for educational learning purposes. Thanks for reading and for all your comments.

Gluten Free BLT

When I go to the grocery store I like to check out the international section to see what interesting foods I can find. The other day I saw spring rolls skin and checked the ingredients which were tapioca starch, rice starch, salt and water, so it was gluten free. Someone mentioned a BLT on their blog and I must have had that in the back of my mind. So I decided to purchase the skins along with some nitrate free bacon and a fresh tomato and some organic mixed lettuce.

I got home and fried up the bacon, sliced the tomato, got the lettuce and mayonnaise and was ready to put my sandwich together. I opened the package of spring rolls skin and was slightly surprised, to say the least. I had no idea a spring roll skin was like a piece of plastic or stiff paper. I wondered if was there something wrong with the skins. A quick check on the internet told me to moisten the skin with water and it would become soft. The first one I tried crumpled up into a ball and I had to toss it. With the next one I got the hang of it, the trick was to handle the skin carefully and add just the right amount of moisture due their thinness. The pattern on the skin you see in the photo below comes from the bamboo mats the skins are dried on after they are rolled out.

I put some mayonnaise on the skin, added a slice of bacon, some lettuce and the tomato and wrapped it up and served it with a pickled okra and the last pepper of the season. Since that time I've found these skins can be used for a variety of sandwiches. Today I made some blue cheese, lettuce, and balsamic vinegar, boy that was good too. How would you use a spring rolls skin? I know there are fried spring rolls, although I try not to fry my foods. but I do use olive oil if I do.

I may have to curtail having too many of these homemade spring roll skins because I just read on the package one skin is 200 calories and all carbohydrates. How could something so thin be 200 calories? Must be concentrated carbohydrates. Ha. But some carbohydrates in the diet are necessary and many times folks who must be gluten free miss out on needed carbohydrates. Not me any longer. Now if they would just make a brown rice spring rolls skin. Hum, maybe there is such a thing. OK, I just looked it up and there is such a thing. Ha. It's been a challenge changing my eating habits to gluten free after more than fifty years. But I'm learning about new foods and new recipes every day. This post is part of Artists in Blogland what's happening in and around the studio. Thanks for reading and for all your comments.

UPDATE: the package says servings per container is 6 and there are a ton of skins in the package so I think the 200 calories is for more than one skin, much better. Ha.

Curls

Here's another tower with 25 strips of clay and it's about 12 x 7 x 2.5 inches. I'm calling it curls because after the making I've taken a carving tool and sliced horizontally into the strips randomly around the pot.and let the slice curl dangle. Maybe not random enough. I'd like to make another one with a few or maybe one really long dangling curl and have the curl a little more curly. Oh I know how I can get the look I want with that long curl.

When I was looking at the piece more closely I was thinking I could apply slip all over the outside, wait for it to dry and then slice some curls in revealing the original clay color beneath. I could have lots of those in different colors. Oh I could also have diagonal slices through the strips or maybe some circles, triangles, squares. So many possibilities, if only I could work faster. Then again, I've got to have the settling in and thinking time too. This post is part of Mud Colony what's happening in the studio. Thanks for reading and for all your comments.

Lovebug Season

The other day at the grocery store I saw one melon for five dollars, I was shocked at that price. Thankfully we have a produce stand nearby where fruits and vegetables are more affordable. That and the local fish market enables us to eat well to try and stay healthy. I worry about families with children wondering how many of them can afford healthy foods which continues to increase in price it seems almost daily. So many other prices continue to rise, like fuel which has increased more than two dollars a gallon in four years.

After living here for more than two years, time does fly, we were happy to afford a small landscape project to usher in the Fall season. Since we're in Florida we thought a tropical plant would be just the atmosphere we needed to enhance our entry. We had a scrawny shrub in this location but in partial shade it languished. Gary and I worked together to install this patch of beauty and are grateful for this small beautification project.
Today we removed the shrub and put in this heliconia, or false bird of paradise, surrounded by bark mulch and some spider plants and a lone orange geranium. I should have taken a before photo but sadly I neglected that small detail. What a difference a small change makes at our home's entry. A spot of color adds so much to enhance our good feelings as we enter and exit our home.

If you look closely at the flower above on the left hand side you'll see two paired lovebugs resting on the flower. It's lovebug season here in Florida; not The Love Bug either. There are two lovebug seasons here, one in Spring and one in Fall, which isn't so lucky. Lovebugs are flying and floating everywhere in the air. If we walk outside they fly into our face and hair. If we drive they cover the front of our car. If they aren't removed immediately, they can take the paint right off. A light spray of cooking oil or a coat of wax before driving helps tremendously in that regard. Thanks for reading and for all your comments

Make Yourself Comfortable

Please make yourself comfortable. My cat Butter loves sleeping in the bathroom sink. He is so large I am not sure how he actually fits in there, but he does.

Here's a windowed tower. It's about 12 x 7 x 3. There are thirty strips of clay in this tower each one has a window except the top. Thanks for reading and for all your comments.

More Fish Platters

It takes me a while to recover from the pieces which don't turn out they way I want. I had high hopes for the sgraffito fish platter from a recent firing but the transparent glaze didn't melt like I wanted. I'm getting ready to sign up for another acrylic painting class so I was feeling painterly yesterday. These fish with their blended underglaze backgrounds, and their gestural qualities seem to suffice for my next round of fish platters. I'd like to achieve these same effects with paint if I can.

Both schools of fish are swimming from right to left. I wonder if I can draw them swimming in the other direction? I read from left to right, but maybe I draw from right to left. I love how they seem to be floating in a sea of forgetfulness, almost hidden from view. Hopefully those ethereal qualities will remain after firing. Thanks for reading and for all your comments.