Handmade in America

Here are some photos of the July 4th Exhibit, the show was nice and came many people. I met wonderful upcoming artist that I will keep a eye on them, and some well know artist as well.

I appeared in many photos because my lovely husband was in charge of the camera and he just likes to take photos of me :s I didn't post all of the photos I thought you may get tired of seeing my face.

So, here is my with my bowl, the bunnies bowl it has a fancy name because my husband is the one who name almost every pot I made, he has the amazing gift of writing, he loves words, play with words and create beautiful stories with those words. Every pot that he name becomes a piece of poetry, if it were for me the bowl will just be white bunnies with him is "Blue Spring Fulgent", much nicer, don't you think? The bowl has so much meaning with him, he put in words feelings, and I found that amazing!!!

This is a wood sculpture made by Candance Knapp, its name is "Sisters of the Holly Flower", it is a set of 3 girls/flowers all made of wood, it is a beautiful piece, I will buy it inmediately if I had the money, just $1800, not so bad if we think that she is quite famous. I have seen her pieces in many places around Florida in solo and group exhibitions. Also the red bird mobile, is another of her creations. 

 

And this wall belong to Linda Pieroth from Apollo Beach, Florida, she works with mosaics. She makes this beautiful images cutting little pieces of glass, adding beads and many things like that. Just beautiful, I like them all, but if I have to choose, I will take the cardinal and the moth, ok, just the cardinal, no, the moth. Her pieces are some what affordable between $300 and $400. If I sold my bowl I will buy one of these. 

Dan Balk Studio, he is the owner and the artist of the Singing Stone Gallery, he made amazing jewelry, beyond pretty and so unique, I am not a person who wear jewelry, just a pair of simple earrings are enough for me, but I can admire the process the art in each of his creations, if I had the money I will buy some for my mom, she loves jewelry and is not shy about wearing big pieces.

Me again :)

 

Again the bowl and I posing with my adorado Briancito !!!

 

The wonderful painting of a rooster by Lynn Rattray tittle "The Senator". I was wondering if she painted it because the show was in Ybor City and there are many chickens and rooster around here, the city of Ybor protect them and therefore they walk freely on the streets. We were looking at the painting and then we heard them, just outside the gallery a couple of them walking around,

 We went outside to try to take a better photo of them. They walked pretty fast, could get any close up.

It was a lovely evening, I meet some new artist and had a good time, after that we went back home and had a nice dinner with my lovely husband. Yesterday I found out that the Tampa Tribune newspaper wrote an  article about the exhibit, here is the link if you want to read it:

Theme of Singing Stone exhibit is all-american

July Exhibits

I am very happy to let you know that I have been accepted to a couple of exhibits yayy!!!. The first one is title "Handmade in America" and it has been hosted by the The Singing Stone Gallery in Ybor City, Tampa. The opening reception will be on July 4th. I submitted 3 photos and they chose the white rabbits jumping around. I think I showed you the photo before, but just in case, here it is.

The second exhibit is the "5th Annual Nature & Wildlife Exhibit" hosted by the St. Augustine Art Association. The Exhibit will go from July 26 to August 31st. Again, so happy, specially because is a theme that I love and works perfectly with what I do. I sent 3 photos and they chose the "Running Hares"  yay!!!
Here is the photo of my plate with the running hares. 

I will let you know about the opening receptions and post some photos :)










 

Branches Tree Plate

Second plate carved ready!
This is a cone 10 plate, the glaze is Dijon, you can see some little yellow spots here and there. Next time I will only apply red oxide wash in some parts and see what happens. I am happy with it anyway. What do you think?

Blue Jay Nest Vase

Finally I made a new version of the Blue Jay Nest, last one I did was around this time of year last year and as you can read it in my previous post ( Blue Jay Nest) I was not happy about it. There are some important changes in the new version, first of all is a bigger vase (yes!!!), second I had no intention to use any latex ever again and third I did not use as much glaze as last time.

The theme is as you can see the same, the difference is the glaze, wow! Glaze does make a huge difference.
I am debating myself weather I should leave the background always empty or if I just keep trying to find a glaze that works for me.



Blue Jay Nest 20014

 

Blue Jay Nest 2013

 

Running Hares Plate

Hello,

Sorry I have been lazy and not writing and a long time. I have been doing some deep carving and later I had a hard time deciding how to glaze them, there are 3 plates, this is the first one ready, there is the second waiting to be fired in the c.10 kiln and there is another one yet waiting for me to do something on it. Good news is that I finally made my mind, and it will be so pretty IF it turned out the way it is in my head. It even had a tittle, yeah right? shouldn't those things comes later it is done and not before it is done??? I know.

There is a small vase that is also ready, I need to take a photo of that too. You will love that because it is the same design I tried a year ago, and that it gave such a headache, remember the one vase that I almost destroy when I apply a latex, no? No worries I will write everything again, probably tomorrow.

This plate is the result of a new shape I am working on, it is not quite I envision but when I trimmed it I knew how to fix it, again it was so thick and the only thing to do when I pot is too thick is to deep carving. The bunnies or in this case, hares are part of the same idea of my previous bowl. I love animation, yo know that I wanted to be an animator when I was 18 or so and I did not become one, so now I just do this designs. At least I am a bit closer to that dream that before, don't you think?

Now that I am looking at the photo I notice that one of the hares really need to exercise more, hahahaha!
What are your thoughts?

Art Walk Show in St. Pete this Saturday!

Yes, I have a show this coming Saturday April 12th. The first show of the year, exciting!

I have many things to do, print some labels, get a table cloth, pack the pieces... thankfully my sister mili is in town and she will help me yay! It will so much fun, I wish you all can come to see me but I know some of you are far away, wish me good luck.

Red-Bellied Woodpecker Bowl

Here it is, the 4th bowl finally ready :)

This time I left the background without any glaze, just some red wash to give it some color and highlight the texture, perhaps I have to work a bit more on the texture, or perhaps I have to keep looking for a nice color for the background, perhaps I have to apply the glaze with a spray which I am not very fun of. . . too smelly, to  complicated, but perhaps I will try it next time.

I have some plates I am working on right now I think I may try the spray gun with them.

But what do you think of this bowl, does it look better than the bowls with glaze in the background?

Turtupilines/ Vermilion Flycatcher

I was super busy yesterday, I had to baby sit Sophie, my dear friend Katalin's baby girl. Well, toddler to be more precise. At the end of the day, I was pretty tired, I can only imagine the life of a full time mom, and if she happens to work regular office hours, ay, ay, ay! I don't know where they can recharge energy for the next day; because today I sleep a little bit more, and did my stuff and as you can see have time to take some photos, but for the mothers everyday starts again the same way: Moooommmmy!

But overall, it was a nice day! I miss my friend Katalin here, easy to reach, so having her and Sophie over was really, really nice. Thank you for coming liebe Kati!

Anyway, here are the photos, the bowl tentative name is "Alighting Upon a Full Limbed Summer" we will see if we keep it or change it.

I picked up the Bowl#2, it looks good. Tomorrow I take more photos and keep you all posted.

Bowl #3

Here is a photo of Bowl#3. This was a very big bowl, the biggest I have ever made. 5.5 pounds of clay!! and I did it all by myself, centering, making it and then decorate it. I choose to carved because I do like carving a lot and the walls of the bowl were not to thin.

The theme was birds, of course, a bird from Lima, it is red and black, its name is turtupilin, well, that is how we Peruvians call this pretty bird. His real name is Pyrocephalus rubinus, here in the US is called Vermilion Flycatcher. This pretty bird is called in many different way around Latin America  some examples are  mosquero sangretoro,  atrapamoscas, mosquero cardenal, mosquero bermellón, saca tu real, atrapamoscas pechirrojo. 

Tomorrow I have to pick it up from the studio, hopefully the glazes worked well together. I will take some photos on Tuesday in the meantime  here are some photos I took in Instagram, there is also a video there if you feel curious, quality is not the best but gives you and idea.

That's all for today, is a gorgeous day outside and I am out of here :). See you on Tuesday!

 

Tazon de conejitos y tazon de pajaritos/ Bunnies and Birds Bowls

Yesterday I picked up the bowls, they look good. I have many ideas for improving and making more, I am happy with the result specially because these are the first ones that have more than one color. In the past I have made may with the slip trailing tool but I just either sprayed them or dipped them.

Here are the photos:

 

I have two more bowls, I carved them. One is in the kiln right now and the other is waiting to be painted. I thought I could finish it today, but between the photos, the laundry and cooking (yes it was my turn to cook) and oh yes, I finished the 3 book of the Hunger Games trilogy, I had not time to seat in my little room and find some peace to paint. I will do it tomorrow. 

Let me know what you think, every comment is well received! 

Four Big Bowls

It is really amazing and scary how fast time goes. The studio opens its doors again the second week of January and right now we are about to start April (!!) And during all this time I have been busy working on new projects, but they just take forever to be ready.

I had accomplished to center and make a 5 pounds or clay bowl yay!! I even think that a 2 of those bowls maybe had more than 5 pounds the weighing scale at the studio is kind of tricky or perhaps I didn't know what I was doing (most likely). Anyway, I made four big bowls, the walls of the first two were a bit thick so I decided to do some carving and the other two I decorated with the slip.

I have been looking the pottery of Carol Long, and I noticed that my work is in a way similar to hers. I love her pottery, she is sooooo amazing!!! She seemed to have found the perfect combination of form and surface decoration the way she glaze her pots wow!

I on the other hand, am still working on that. So, I decided to decorated my bowls in my usual way and keep in mind her glazing technique (I don't really know for certain how she glazes her pots but after looking tons of photos of her FB page, I think I have an idea). When I started the glazing fallowing what I thought was her technique I find out that I was wrong, my glazes run again and again, perhaps her glazes and her slip decorations are thicker? At the end I did what I always do, just painted with brushes instead of the slip trailing tool. although in some areas that tool was very helpful.

On Monday I will be able to see the result, I really can't wait, hopefully the glazes would not run and if they did I hope they do in a nice way. Just one more day to see them.

In the mean time here are the photos of the bowls in greenware state. . . Well, apparently it is not easy to recover photos from instagram to my computer. So while I tried to figure it out how to do it, here is the link, I did some bunnies thinking that eastern is coming and my usual birds on a tree.

I will take normal photos on Tuesday to post them here. You can go to the link and see more photos on my instagram account, and of course you can follow me there as well. See you on Tuesday, I will post the results.

Happy Sunday!

I am back again, I found a way to use my instagram photos on Picasa. Here they are.

 

Florida Heat 2014

I know, I know, I have been away for a while, but life gets complicated sometimes. I still have a pile of things to do that I can not when I will be able to finish. Perhaps it will be faster if I just focus on the things I need to do instead of the things I like to do. For example, in that pile there is a paper I need to finish since for ever, photos I need to take of my recent pottery, etc, etc. But what do I do instead rush into full day workshop.

The workshop is called Florida Heat and is hosted by St. Pete Clay Company, a great place in St. Petersburg. I just to live in St. Pete (that's how we call our little town) before I got married, now I live in Tampa; these 2 towns are what is call the Tampa Bay Area. But, I digress, Florida Heat is a 5 day workshop, and this year many of my all time favorite potters where here, in my town, I couldn't be more excited when I found out about it. However it is very expensive workshop, or at least it is for me. So, I could only afford to go to one day, one fantastic day with Julia Galloway, Michael Kline, Chandra DeBuse and Adam Field, but thing was that many of the projects that they were showing needed more than one day, so I HAD to go next day also. Luckily for me, I had a great and supportive husband that spoils me so much (I love you so much Briancito!)

Next day I was great too, and I meet Forrest Middelton. I have to confess I wasn't so into his pottery, I know is bad of me, but I am not to thrill about stencils and transfers, but he is so awesome, that I might tried it. The things he does with clay... you have to see it. The only sad thing was that I couldn't see one of my favorites potters, Kristen Kieffer, but I am planning to buy her DVD to compensate my loss. Also I miss the presentation of Lisa Orr and Benjamin Carter, I didn't know much about them but now I am so intrigued, specially by the pottery of Lisa Orr, her pottery is so wild and organic, check it out if you have some time.

Perhaps with all the knowledge this wonderful potters where so generous to share I can improve my pottery skills, and I can have more sales, with that money I think I will go to a hands-on workshop in the future. I discover that is better to practice a little and have some knowledge so one can ask the right questions, otherwise one thinks understand but when practice the knowledge one found some gaps. If you know what I mean. Also, I want to have their pottery with me, I want to touch them and look at them I have to work on my sales skills, because I need those pots!

Here are some photos, I am planning to make collages and put in practice what I learn, but it will take me some time. I hope you can understand.

My favorite potters: Kristen Kieffer, Chandra DeBuse and the wonderful Julia Galloway

I like their work so much and now that I have the pleasure to meet them I am head over heels. Their pottery really match their persona. I can understand now why they do what they do, is because their pottery is just a projection of themselves. And now I like them even more, after the workshop there is a thought  that don't leave my mind, going to Montana, yes super cold and nothing but cows Montana, just because Julia Galloway works at the Archie Bray Foundation and it gets worse, I want to be part of the show they have once a year, just because I want Julia Galloway to like me isn't that silly. Well, being accepted there is very prestigious too, so that is my next goal. . . I wonder how many years will that take me?

In the mean time I am working on some huge bowls I had successfully made on the wheel, if they survive I will show you some pictures in the next days. Wish me luck!

Octopus's Garden Collection

I have been pretty busy lately, these days I am always busy and when not so tired, that I don't feel like doing anything, except watching Netflix. The new season of "What not to wear" is available on streaming and I am just addicted to it. I am not ashamed to admit it.

Also, I had catching on movies, the Hobbit and Catching Fired, are so good, you should go and see them.

You see, very busy ;)

Here is the Octopus's Collection, there are some more to come, I promise will posted tomorrow night. I posted this on my FB page and turn out to be quite popular, what do you think?

Starry Night Collection

This is the Starry Night Collection, again the big dinner plate is missing, still drying.... to many factors, unusual humidity and cold weather in Florida, to many holidays in a row (the studio is close for the holidays), me not feeling too well, again because of the weather. Anyhow, you can have an idea with this photo.

It makes me so happy to have sets, don't know why didn't think about it before; I started making it because a friend of mine wants a set of 8 for her house, plus Judy always said: make sets, make sets. So, I finally did what they were long saying and this is the result. What do you think?

Blue Birds of Happiness collection

This is the "Blue Birds of Happiness" Collection, in the photo the big dinner plate is missing, takes so much time to dry and the usually shiny Florida has been cold  humid lately therefore, the dinner plate is not yet ready, however since I had the Shopapalooza Show last week, I decided to go ahead and make a photo of it.

I also have two versions of the clouds you see in the bowls, one is blue as you can see it and the other one is white, it seems that the blue was more popular. I am posting these in my Etsy store, I think that any piece of this set can be a wonderful Christmas gift, of course a whole dinning set will be spectacular, but I think that not many people will be able to afford it. My wish is that people use my pottery in a daily basis, but I can not make it any cheaper that it already is. Every piece is unique and takes time to make it and decorate it. I know it will be easier and faster to just use stickers or stencils; even the so famous and expensive Vietri Italian pottery use stencil! However, even when they are so pretty, all of them are the same, you don't have a unique object, the one you purchased is almost exactly the same as the other millions that they make.

I wonder if this is the right path to walk, perhaps I should stop being naive and romantic, perhaps I should stop making unique pieces and start thinking more as a business woman, thinking only on how to sell more, what will people will want and make it, find the way to make millions of identical pieces for a Walmart kind of price (Walmart and Target mugs are $5 dollars, mine are $25)

It is a real struggle to sell, at least for me. I am happy when I make them, when selling not so much, it is so hard for me. I don't think that $25 is to much, is 2 tickets to the movies on 3D or IMAX, is one entree in a nice restaurant, is one t-shirt at a nice store, so it is not that expensive, don't you think?

Anyway, I have to go back to cleaning my little room of requirements, it is so chaotic. I also have to work on my Etsy store, I usually don't do much there, and I should.

There are 5 more collection, I will try to post them daily.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving day here in the USA. Is a day when families and friends get together to celebrate to be able to be together and to be thankful of all the things one has.

I am very thankful this year, I got married with my best friend Brian, my sister is in town, my mom lives very close to me, my cousin Ceci is living in Tampa this year, and her smart and beautiful daughter Isabella, just light my day every time I see her. I have family close to me, tia Isabel is here too, and some weeks ago my uncle tono y tia mariana were here visiting. I have very good friends here in the Tampa Bay area and incredible friends overseas that even when we are so geographically apart, it seems like we are just a "microbus" away.

I am very thankful to be able to do what I like, paint, pottery, gardening and bakery. I also have to do some cleaning and cooking, but it is a small price to pay. My days are usually the same everyday not very exciting adventures every week, but I like it, what I am saying I love it. I enjoy my routine, may be boring for some but I am do enjoy it.

I am very thankful for my health, that even when right now is not at its best, it is better than it has been in years. And from now on, I am sure it will get better and better.

I am also thankful for being able to sell some of my stuff last Saturday at the Shopapalooza. I carried many of my "seconds" and people purchased them, that made my day. And, of course, I sold some of my nice pottery and receive tons of compliments which made me very happy. I was part of the Etsy Village, which put together a group of Tampa Bay Area Etsy sellers among the regulars Shopapalooza vendors. Thank you Stephanie MacGrath for making this happen! And thank you all the TBEC members, I was very lucky to have found such an amazing group.

Here are a couple of photos from the show, Briancito is in one of them, he is always with me helping me, and I am very thankful, blessed and happy to have him.

Pedestal Bowls

I have been trying new things on the wheel thiese pedestal bowls started as "not the right size" kind of bowl, and they looked like they were part of something. I have been thinking on pedestals for a while now, so I thought: why not!
This are the first two examples, of many to come... I like pedestals, I will do more.
The first photo is with the "Ephemeral Wisp of Flower" and the second with "Blue Birds of Happiness: collection.

Massimo's Jewelry Box

It is ready, as we said int the pottery studio: "the Kiln's Gods" have been nice. The piece turn out just the way I wanted.

Here it is. I mailed today and it is expected to arrived in Arlington Texas on Monday. I hope it helps to reach money and help spread the word about this terrible disease and the cured for Eosinophilic Esophagitis will be soon discovered.

If you live in Arlington Texas, try to stop by at the Arlington Classic Academy  next Saturday, November 16th the Craft Fair goes from 9 to 5. There will be many things for kids and adults, plus you can buy a ticket and enter to raffle to win the Massimo's Jewelry Box. Or is it a silent action. Not sure, but you can find out. Plus you will be helping a nice cause.

Massimo's Jewelry Box

The little Scarlet Tanager Bird (Piranga olivacea) lives in the Northeast forest of  the US during the summer. When winter comes it flees to south American countries like Peru, Ecuador, Colombia and Bolivia. It makes a short stop before crossing the Gulf of Mexico, which give us, Floridians, the opportunity to see it.

It is a medium size bird that sings wonderful  tunes. I have chosen to decorate one of my boxes with this bird because, this little bird can be seen in Lima, Tampa and Dallas among other cities. These cities became special when I found out about Massimo.

Massimo is a two year old boy who has Eosinophilic Esophagitis, he lives in Dallas, Texas. His mother and I were high school classmates back in Lima, some years ago. I got back in touch with her during the days of the American Made contest. (Remember the contest? who could ever forget, right? Voting everyday for weeks. Well, during those days I got in touch with many of my former classmates. They were wonderful voting for me everyday, and you know how FB is, you get in touch with friends and friends of friends. When the contest ended, my friend Marissa invited me to "Like" her page Support for Massimo. On this page she talks about Massimo and his disease:

"Massimo is 2 years old and has been recently diagnosed with Eosinophic Esophagitis, he also has dysphagia, food aversion, asthma, chronic ear infections, GERD, developmental delays, celiac disease and failure to thrive. He also has a feeding tube. It has been hard to even reach the correct diagnosis, he has suffered since birth and we had to push, fight and plead to get where we are. If you want to know more about these diseases and our journey, you are welcome to follow this page"

The recent news about Massimo is that he no longer needs to have or to use the feeding tube and that his disease is in remission. Hurray for Massimo!! However, he still needs to be super careful about what he eats which I can only imagine must be really hard for his mother. Children usually don't ask permission to eat, if they see something they like, they just grab it and eat it. 

On November 16th will be an Craft Fair in Arlington, a city close to  Dallas, TX.  Massimo's  10 year old sister will be there selling  hand-made bracelets and the money she raises will be donate to CURED. Her mother wanted to buy one of my pieces so she can do a silent auction or something: she is very determined to make this disease well-known and to find a cure for her little boy. 

With all these things on my mind, I thought how I might contribute. What can I do that will be small and not too expensive to mail to TX; what can I do that would  make people want to contribute? Perhaps I could make something someone might buy as a present, perhaps something for their personal use . . . Who are the ones usually buying my pieces, that I know? My pieces are often purchased by women. What do women like, jewelry, so what about a jewelry box? It is small and can make a great gift, something that you use and is also decorative. I decided to carve the piece with birds, and I chose the Scarlet Tanager bird because this little bird flies around where we live. Perhaps the same little bird can be resting in Massimo's garden and then he can show up in my garden, before going to visit Massimo's family in Peru. Then, he flies back, and so we all can send our love to Massimo with this little bird.


The jewelry box will be my small contribution in the search of finding a cure for the  Eosinophilic Esophagitis. I don't have money but I do have clay ; ) Hopefully someone will like my piece and buy or bid for it. 

Here are the photos of the process, tomorrow it will fired again and hopefully it will look good, Then it will be mailed to TX and arrive just in time for the event.

Painting again!

Hi,
It has been a while since my last post, I have been very busy, trying to finish the dinner-table sets and working in the garden. Well, I have not finish either, garden takes so much time and the results are going to be visible in 10 years from now... OMG!! how can I get involved in something that requires so much time? I guess because I have this dream of a garden full of flowers and butterflies and just keep thinking on the goal. It does look better than last year, but not yet the way I wanted.
Anyway, in the field of pottery, I am still working, I had some troubles with my plates, one cracked, and others had problems on their foot so I have to make more, and more, and there are still more to be made. But I had to stop of making plates and did some bowls and boxes for a change.
I am working in the "Blue Birds of Happiness" Collection and the "Starry Night" Collection, a little sgraffito and a little of just free hand painting.

This are the photos of the greenware with the Blue Birds theme, I forgot to take a photo with the Starry Night, it has been a while since the last time I photograph the process, I will start to do that again. 

In the photos you can see the 2 bowls and the little box I did, all with the same theme. Behind, covered with blue plastic are the bowls that later I decorated with the sgraffito technique. I still have to make plates, yes more plates and mugs with that theme, so photos will come.