Looks like the Wheel C classroom is coming along nicely with brand new shelving for the students… can’t wait to see everyone filing them up!!! My new class starts next Tuesday night!!! Just hoping it’s not a crazy, mad-dash-rush to get the good ones… although we all know it will be!

And it looks like someone else had been busy too… new shelves are already going up in the Wheel C classroom… looks like we’ll actually have new shelves ready when the new class session starts next week at Lillstreet!

Looks like Lillstreet is getting a small make-over! Well, at least in the Wheel C classroom…
where there “used to be” shelves there against that wall?! I know they’re working hard
to make new shelves before our classes start up again next week!

But look how nice & spacious it appears without the shelves… just sayin’…

As part of our last class, my students participated in a fun little “white elephant” trading-exchanging-stealing game with sets of two matching mugs. They received the challenge early on this session… and for the most part… everyone did an AMAZING job!!! There were just a couple who didn’t quite finish the challenge?!… but still played the game!

CHRISTINE’s set of matching mugs…

MICHELLE’s set of matching mugs…

KATE’s set of matching mugs…

PATTY’s set of matching mugs…

KATIE’s set of matching mugs…

CATHERINE’s set of matching mugs…

And a little close-up to show the subtle detail of Catherine’s glazing on porcelain.

JACOB’s set of matching mugs…

DAN’s set of matching mugs…

CASEY’s set of matching mugs…

TINA’s set of matching mugs…

Oh wait… just to show the scale of Tina’s teeny-tiny cutie-patooties…

DANIELLE’s’s set of matching mugs… with a wonderful theme… which coincidentally
& ironically is the set that I ended up with and took home with me last night.
It seemed only fitting!!!

ASHLEY’s set of matching mugs… err, well, just one.
The “matching” mug didn’t quite come out of the kiln in time.
So Ashley’s mug came with an IOU for the second one!

SUSAN’s set of matching mugs…
And yes, Susan is my teaching assistant… which explains the perfect set of matched porcelain mugs with a striking black underglaze geometric design!

JOSE’s set of matching mugs… oh well… a pretty little trio of blue bowls and not mugs?!

ALLISON’s set of matching mugs… err, a nice vase… as apparently Allison didn’t get her cups done in time. I know she’s made a lot of mugs this session, but apparently didn’t get her matching set done in time for class. I think time kinda slipped away from her!

All in all, a wonderful way to celebrate the last class of the session. They all did such a wonderful job. And stepped up to the challenge of “MATCHING” which is not an easy task to take on!

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This week in my Tuesday night Beginning & Advanced Beginning Wheelthrowing class, we tackled making bowls. Yep… making bowls on purpose instead of a cylinder gone bad. I started with my bowl demo… starting with a good interior curve right from the start! After we had covered all of the “basocs” of basic bowls… they went back to their whee;s to start throwing their own bowls. Meanwhile… I continued throwing more bowls. A total of EIGHTEEN “basic” bowls.

When I had made all of MY owls, we re-grouped at my wheel for a little “decorating” FUN!!! My goal for the secodn part of the demo is to encourage them to PLAY WITH THEIR CLAY!!! To do some decorating… to make thier bowls their own. The wheel pretty much makes them round… now they get to make them their own style!!! So I quickly took my 18 “matching” bowls and started doing some quick & simple “tricks” to make them all different & special!!!

Bowl One – Here’s the “basic” bowl.. the starting point for all the others!!!

Bowl Two – Two simple “flutes” to add some flair. One finger inside, one finger outside. pinch and twist.

Bowl Three – And if two flutes are cute, maybe eight would be better?!

Bowl Four – A simple one-inch flange bent out to “widen” the bowl.

Bowl Five – And if one-inch is nice, maybe three inches would be better?!

Bowl Six – And then a combined, bent-out flange and four fluted twists.

Bowl Seven – Using a metal dragon-scaling tool… a simple flower indented in the bottom.

Bowl Eight – A split-rim pinched together in eight places.

Bowl Nine – Another split rim – dented inwards at four places.

Bowl Ten – Another split rim this time dented inwards four times, and outwards four times!

Bowl Eleven – This was last session’s “challenge” bowl… a TRIPLE split rim and then fluted in eight places. My students from last session now refer to this one as the “churro” bowl!

And then I introduced my “beginner’s” to colored slip… and then benefits.

Bowl Twelve – a simple coat of thick white slip  applied and then a spiral dragged through it with the curved end of my wooden knife… which I’ve now been told is called “The Potter’s Thumb.”

We noticed that the thick white slip wasn’t showing up very well for my demo purposes…
so we switched to black!

Bowl Thirteen – A layer of black slip – and then banded rings with “The Potters Thumb.”

Bowl Fourteen – A layer of black slip, and then a chattered pattern made by rhythmic tapping of a rounded rib as the bowl is spinning.

Bowl Fifteen – A layer of black slip, followed by some thick white slip squirt-bottled onto the surface… ala Ryan Greenheck!

Bowl Sixteen – Then using the same squirt bottle, I piped on a white slip spiral.

Bowl Seventeen – Using a couple strips of wet newspaper, I outlined a triangle… layered in some thick white slip, draged my finer through it to make some texture lines and then peeled away the newspaper “stencils.”

Bowl Eighteen – Always up for a challenge… this is the one this session. Stacey was sitting-in on class and she saw this bowl on her Instagram feed. So I tried my best to “mimic” the style… flaring out the flanged rim, denting down the four accent areas, and then piping some thick white slip accents. Coincidentally, Stacey was also the one who challenged me to the triple rim “churro” bowl last session

So for now they’re all “under wraps” in my studio. I think there’s a”very good chance” that there might still be a bit of embellishing & stamping to be done on them… maybe, just maybe?!

 

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So I just got my schedule for Summer Camp 2019 at Lillstreet Art Center.
Excited that we’ve confirmed schedules as it makes me feel like Summer may not be all that far away?! Also excited that two of my favorite Summer Campers are already checking the camp schedules to see which ones they’re going to take this summer… over a cup of tea… tea for two!!!

JUNE 17th-21th – Wheelthrowing – 9:00am-1:00pm

JULY 8th-12th – Sculptures Big to Small – 9:00am-3:30pm

JULY 15th-19th – Chess Camp – 9:00am-3:30pm

AUGUST 5th-9th – Fire, Forge & Feast – 9:00am-3:30pm

AUGUST 12th-16th – Sculptures Big to Small – 9:00am-3:30pm

AUGUST 19th-23rd – Wheelthrowing – 9:00am-1:00pm

Click on the link here for more information & registration.

Okay, so I would love to call this the POTTERY OLYMPICS…
but that only happens every four years! Ha!!!

So this week in class after we critiqued , judged & awarded the Nesting Bowls…
we moved onto the POTTERY OLYMPICS… okay, so maybe it’s not so bad…

We started by dividing the class into four teams of three. I had pre-chosen the Team Captains… by splitting up the couples… so it was Molly vs. Jacob vs. Patti vs. Jon. But then we found out that Jon was not coming to class for a medical issue… so his “Captain-manship” was handed off to Teresa who had just finished eating Jon’s dinner! So the four Team Captains chose their teams and we were almost ready to move on… except one team only had two people. So I drafted my friend Natalie who has recently returned to Chicago & Lillstreet to join us in the activities. She was great to agree on such short notice!!!

To kick it off… I had each team fill out a worksheet to assign who might be the “competitor” in some of the challenges… only using cryptic hints as to what the challenge would be.

CHALLENGE ONE
Each team had one bag of clay, a wire tool and one competitor to cut it up into predetermined weights. No scale. No weighing of the pieces. Just their best judgement with a chance to compare each ball to each other. At the end of the challenge, we weighed the balls of clay… to add up the variances. Team that was the closest to the correct weights would win the challenge!

We then did a bit of housekeeping…
Each team had a chance to even out their weighting mistakes, making sure their balls of clay were the correct weight. They then wedged them up – while another member of their team set-up a wheel for future throwing challenges!

CHALLENGE TWO
This time we had two competitors for each team… each using a two-pound ball of clay. They had a limited amount of time to hand roll the longest coils they could…. and limited table space! And here’s the twist… if your coil were to break during the challenge, you’re done! No squishing it back together. We would just measure the longest segment while the others continue to roll clay.

CHALLENGE THREE
For the next challenge… it was the third member of each team who did NOT roll a coil that was up! Now they had to use the recently-rolled coils to build the tallest coil cylinder. Simple enough, right? They could not continue rolling the coils… and it had to be freestanding at the end.

CHALLENGE FOUR
We then switched to a wheelthrowing challenge. All three players on each team would get a 3-pound ball of clay. Using one wheel per team, they would take turns throwing matching bowls! The first person would throw a bowl, and then they switched places as the second person stepped up to match that first bowl. Now with two bowls in, the third person stepped in to match the first two! Harder than it sounds… since there was no going back to “fix up” or alter the previous bowls!

CHALLENGE FIVE
We stuck with wheelthrowing for the next challenge… this time with two pre-determined players. Again with a three pound ball of clay they had to throw one “perfect” bowl. And here’s the twist… One throwing. One driving. Yep, one person was doing all of the centering & throwing… while the other person had complete control over the speed on the foot pedal.

 Whoops!!!…  I missed the photos of this one! But trust me, it was fun to watch!

CHALLENGE SIX
After two wheelthrowing challenges… we switched back to handbuilding for a slab throwing competition. With five pounds of clay, they had to throw the largest slab of clay… round-robin fashion with each team member taking a turn. And again, if their slab broke at any point… they were done with the challenge. No squishing it back together! Largest surface area wins!

It’s a “shame” no one had any fun!!!

CHALLENGE SEVEN
For their final challenge.. and the funniest… for me… each team had to throw one final “perfect” bowl with a four pound ball of clay. They would each have two minutes… switch… two minutes… switch… two minutes… Two full rounds of working on the same bowl. Yes, each team would continue to work on their one bowl to make it as “perfect” as they could. Each person had two “two-minute” chances to help their team

And here’s the best part… for ME at least… all the while BLINDFOLDED!!!

And then the final challenge envelope… THEIR HOMEWORK!!!

PSYCH!!!

They have no homework this week as they have all been working so hard over the past couple weeks.. the deserve a break – and some tie to make what ever they want for a change!

And again, I have the BEST STUDENTS EVER!!!
Each of them embraced my crazy challenges and played along with my silly reindeer games!

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As the snow continued to fall all day today…
it’s somewhat “encouraging” to know that some people are already planning Summer Camps for their kids!!!

I know I for one can’t wait to get back to Summer… and  SUMMER CAMP at Lillstreet!!!

Last night was only the second class of our new session of wheelthrowing classes at Lillstreet… and my students killed it when they made their first batch of mugs!!! Two classes and they’ve already made MUGS!!! And then we ended class with a little stamp-making too… so maybe their “next” mugs will have some stamped textures??? We can only hope, right?

We’re in the middle of the week of CHESS CAMP at Lillstreet. My summer campers have made a LOT of really cool chess pieces already to fill their themes. Today we started creating their chess boards… and then took a bit of a break after lunch for them to hone their skills.

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