Lost and Found

After my talk at GoMA yesterday (which despite my nerves and jitters went really well and was actually lots of fun!), I got chatting to a man who had bought a few of my pieces. A lover and collector of glass and ceramics I was excited to discover that he owned my all time favourite piece!! I made this little tape measure vessel (pictured above, about 4cm high) a couple of years ago and it still remains one of my favs. I like the way the imagery works with the form, how it wraps around the cylindrical shape. But there is also an element of nostalgia for me in this piece, memories of being a teenager in the 80s learning how to sew drop waist dresses (oh yes, I was very fashionable) with my mum, most of them ending up half-finished, shoved in my sewing box never to be seen again! My mum remembers me having a very short attention span for sewing and she can’t quite believe I have the patience to make the work I make now! But even though I may not be very good at sewing and I may not have a lot of patience for it, I absolutely love it. I’m a total sucker for anything to do with textiles and this is reflected in a lot of my work. I use old sewing patterns as imagery on some of my pieces, pattern wheels to make lines of perforations in my vessels and wall pieces, old crochet patterns and knitting instructions.

Visually I’m really drawn to the dotted lines, the dashes, the sweeping arcs and angles in sewing patterns, the tea colour of the old tracing paper they were printed on. It all reminds me of hot summers in our beautiful old house in Murwillumbah sewing with my mum. Although if you ask her I don’t think she’d remember it quite as fondly….a tantrum throwing huffy little teenager frustrated by how DUMB the sewing machine was!! Anyway, I’ve been hankering lately to do something with textiles. I’m very curious to see if my attention span and patience threshold has increased from when I was 14. I’ll keep you posted!

After the talk we went and had a (much needed) drink and I was talking to some other artists about how nice it is to know where your work ends up, and to meet the people who own it. I keep track of certain pieces, mostly my exhibition works, but I had somehow lost track of that little tape measure vessel and had actually wondered a few times where it got to! And now I know! So you can all stop worrying...

A bit of housekeeping

Just a reminder that I'm going to be speaking at the Gallery of Modern Art (GOMA) this Sunday at 1.30pm so if anyone is in the Brisvegas area feel free to come along for a chat! More details here and here.

We've also just posted some brand new Little People over at Sandwich Mountain.

Cloth and Wrap

Last night Kenji, Pru and I went to listen to Julie Patterson of CLOTH (images above) give an artist talk in at Deka Furniture . Great talk, great work and a great find in a rubbish bin on the way home...we love bubble wrap we do! So all in all a very successful mission!

The more the merrier!

Well the list of ceramic artists blogging is slowly but surely getting longer and longer. The more the merrier I say, especially when they are of the ilk of Carol Epp and Pru Morrison! And yes, perhaps I am just a little biased because they are both very good friends of mine, but I like to think that I can still make objective judgements regardless of that! These two covergirls wow me with their work, their ideas and their sense of humour and compassion. All rolled up together it makes for two super artists whose brand new blogs will no doubt be good reading! Make sure you go and visit and pop them on your little lists of bumper blogs.

Little Uns

I made these little uns last year. I was inspired after a trip to Korea and thought I’d experiment with a technique called inlay, which I had never done much of. And might not do much of again! Talk about time consuming and finicky! Each little dot was drilled in and then filled with a different coloured clay. It then gets scraped back and sanded before being fired. A glutton for punishment I was (still am?). Each little cup is just 4cm high. I held on to these. There's very few pieces of my work i absolutely refuse to part with. But there was just something about these ones that i really loved. So now they all live on a sunny little window ledge in my sleepout.

Blooming beautiful!

It is the most beautiful day here today! Cool, crisp, clear and so so blue....with just a little splash of red!

ETSY

Well it's been a while in the coming but I have finally started my ETSY shop. Gosh, I'm feeling so high-tec! And after setting it up I don't care if I never sit in front of a computer again for as long as I live!! I tell ya, it seems so long since I've had a day in the studio, a full, uninterrupted day of making....it's been a good learning curve though, muddling my way through all of this, so I won't complain! I am only selling a few ranges of work through the etsy shop, but feel free to email me if you're interested in any other pieces that aren't up there.

So time to go and clear my head and have a wander in the rain...yes, RAIN!!! I couldn't quite believe it when I heard it hammering down on my roof last night! Yippee!! My garden is so so so so happy! For those of you who aren't aware, we're in the middle of a serious drought here in Brisbane...

You can visit my ETSY shop HERE!

Meet the Makers

“The Gallery formerly known as Craft QLD” is having another Meet the Artists session Friday June 1 from 10:30am till 12pm. Local ceramicist Cathy Keys is going to be speaking about her work, along with jewellers Roz Fenson and Emily Burke, and knitter/quilter/cushion maker/jeweller Leigh Hamilton Park. Worth dropping in if you're around.

(Cathy’s work pictured above)

Shakin in my boots

Yesterday was a big day for me. After I shook off my nasty dream of broken pots, I headed off to GOMA to have a cup of tea and a chat and a wander around the gallery with someone whose work I really admire and who has had a huge influence on me, particularly when I first started out in ceramics. I have wanted to meet her for so long, so it was pretty special to spend the afternoon sipping coffee with Gwyn Hanssen Pigott (image above and below left) chatting about this and that and having a fine old dandy time!

The reason we hooked up is that I’ve been asked by GOMA to give a talk on some work from their collection. Yep, can you hear my knees knocking from wherever you are?? Yikes, nothing like a bit of public speaking to make me wanna go and hurl in the nearest bathroom! But nerves, random muscle spasms and inferiority complexes aside, the gallery is running a great program where artists are invited to choose works from the collection to speak about - a favourite work, how they might have influenced their practice etc - the idea being that people might get a different insight or a new perspective on the works on display or in the collection. So of course, there was never any question as to whose work I would choose. But I’m also going to be talking about another amazing work (conveniently located right next to Gwyn’s) by LIU Xiao Xian (brother of Ah) called The Way We Eat, (image below) a series of 33 incredible porcelain cutlery pieces. Yep, right up my alley!

Gwyn was very gracious and generous to come in and talk to me about the piece I’ve chosen. I'm feeling pretty inspired after that. The talk is on Sunday June 17th at 1:30pm. Up on the second floor of GOMA. And I’m totally cool about it……absolutely relaxed…..can’t wait……only 22 more sleeps…..

In my dreams

When I woke up this morning a huge wave of relief washed over me as I realised it had only been a dream! More like a nightmare actually. I’ve been working on a public art project for the last 18 months and it’s due to be installed sometime over the next couple of months. The closer the installation gets, the more horrible the dreams I have….smashed pieces, no time to make any more, angry architects….you get the idea! Last night I dreamed that I picked up one of the pieces only to see that it had a big crack down the side. And then, when I went to pick up the others I suddenly realised I had forgotten to fire them and they just crumbled in my hands! My 18 months of work was a pile of shards! It’s been a great project to work on - a huge long learning curve – but I will be very VERY glad when it is finally installed and out of my studio!!

Here’s a (teeny tiny barely visible) little sneak peak of the work (above), which is being permanently installed at the new Southbank Institute of TAFE Library. It’s made up of 15 very fine black and white porcelain vessels. The imagery on them is drawn from/inspired by the history of the site and the surrounding environment. One of my favourite pieces is decorated with an excerpt from an old syllabus from the 1920s. The subject was called “housewifery” and taught students “how to clean a living room, bedroom, bathroom and kitchen”. It also taught them how to remove stains – specifically tea, coffee, fruit, mildew and ink, how to dispose of waste, economy in furnishing (I need that course), starching “D’Oyleys” and most importantly - how to crimp and goffer…..huh??

Sandwich Mountain

The Little People's blog is up and running! Check it out here.

Good Friday

slipcast wall pieces 6cm x 5cm and 6cm x 6cm

A nice start to the day today. Not only did I wake to the sound of pattering rain (it's been so long!), but also to a lovely kiln load of work, full of blue bits! And a few new little people too! But I won't be posting those just yet....we've had so much response to those funny little folk that we've decided to start a blog totally devoted to them and their adventures. They've been getting out and about a lot lately too so lots of new pics. Should be up and running soon.

slipcast porcelain with decals 9cm x 5cm

So being a rainy day I guess I don't have to work huh??! That sounds perfectly reasonable to me! It's been so long since we've had a day like this that I think I will have to honour it by reading novels and drinking cups of tea all day! I have been a very lazy and distracted camper this last week (very unlike me), so I figure I'll just go with it and my concentration and focus will come back soon enough. It's this working from home business you see....as much as I am enjoying it there are so many distractions around every corner! Have a nice weekend!

Oh, and here's a good read: Diana Fayt's recent post over at One Black Bird. Here here I say Diana!

Come on Skip!

A few years ago, when I was doing a little sojourn at the Canberra School of Art, I made a cup for a Canadian friend of mine, a white coffee mug with a little kangaroo bouncing around the bottom of it and the words “come on skip” (a quote from the iconic tv show Skippy) printed next to it. It was a joke really, a kitsch little Australiana souvenir for her, but over the years that little kangaroo just keeps popping up in my work. Recently I’ve been developing this series of porcelain wall pieces (above). You can keep adding pieces, and make him jump longer and higher. Go skip go! And it seems I’m not the only one with a kangaroo preoccupation. I keep stumbling across wonderful kangaroo-inspired work lately. While browsing the Craft Victoria website a few months ago I found this very stylish interpretation of the kangaroo by Melbourne jeweller Anna Davern. Florence Forrest (below right) has also been making some lovely creatures based on the kangaroo (see more of them here). And Pru Morrison (below left) whipped up a few nice kanga pieces recently for her show at Ray Hughes Gallery . A kanga here and a kanga there.

So I’m thinking skip's got a message for me.....

What’s that skip?

There is just something about the iconic, nostalgic, kitsch Australian-ness of the kangaroo that I love. Now if you (Australians?) want a little trip down memory lane check this out…

The Infinity Room

Ever wondered what it would be like to stand amongst the stars? Well I’ve just discovered a little room where you can at least get a taste of what it might be like. I’ve mentioned the Asia Pacific Triennial a number of times, and it’s drawing to a close soon, so I went back recently to have a final look and discovered I had missed this little gem of an artwork by Yayoi Kusama called Soul Under the Moon (2002). From the outside it looks like a tiny nondescript room with a door. You open the door and walk in to this dark, quiet, never ending reflection of fluorescent balls and mirrors and water – an infinity room! If you happen to get a few minutes to yourself in there (lots of patience required for this, and don’t even bother on a weekend) it is like you are standing amongst the stars – so dark, so quiet, so disorienting, so amazing! A photo just can’t do it justice so you’ll just have to trust me on this one.

Anish Kapoor’s sculptures are fun too. The ambiguity of them, of the spaces within them (or not). It’s more fun looking at the people looking at the work trying to work out what it is they are actually looking at (or not)!

Paul Wood

Paul Wood is a Melbourne based artist who makes wonderful sculptures of found objects. I first met Paul and saw his work at the 3rd World Ceramic Biennale in South Korea a few years ago. I loved his piece Maeshi kromb and mash where after having dinner with his family he picked up the dishrack filled with all the washed up dinner dishes, saucepans and cutlery etc and popped it in the kiln lock stock and barrel and fired it until everything melted and slumped and warped. His exhibition Domestic Slump (above) at Craft Victoria in 2005 was a group of precarious towers of similarly slumped domestic objects, and his latest show (image below) has just opened at the La Trobe University Visual Arts Centre , and looks like a cracker! Someone has been busy raiding the bathroom section of op shops! You can read a bit more about the work here. It's on until May 28. Wish I could go....i like Victoria....and it must be so lovely and chilly there right now....

Tagged again

Righty ho then, I've been a little tardy in my response to my tagging by Florence at Windbag and Thunder - but being the first day of the week (I know its Tuesday but twas a public holiday here yesterday) I'm going through all the things I didn't get around to last week and crossing them off my list before I start on this week's things. Yes, very organised of me. So, seven random facts it is then...

1. I was born in Papua New Guinea and spent the first 2 years of my life in Port Moresby.

2. If I wasn't a ceramic artist I would like to be a carpenter or woodworker and design and make furniture. I still just might.

3. One of my favourite songs ever is Going Up the Country by Canned Heat. I can't help it but that song just makes me smile and involuntarily bounce up and down.

4. I’m a morning person. Which can sometimes be very annoying for those who aren’t......

5. I prefer winter over summer (at least in the part of the world where I live)

6. I recently joined a gym for the first time in my life (except for a surreal and fleeting period when I lived in Japan, but I won't count that). For the last week I have barely been able to walk or raise my arms above my shoulders without wincing. Apparently its good for me.

7. Like Florence, I too am a fan of vegemite on toast. I may not eat it every single morning like she does, but guaranteed the second I set foot out of Australia all I want is vegemite on toast. I don't travel without it. It's a comfort thing. Mmmmm...I'm gonna eat it for breakfast this morning......

(I just found a great You Tube clip here of Canned Heat performing Going Up The Country live at Woodstock. Its not the greatest sound, but the clip is hilarious! Lots of naked hippies. Be warned.)

4th World Ceramic Biennale

The 4th World Ceramic Biennale opened in South Korea this week. I had some work from my Precious Little series (left) selected for it. All these pieces are really really tiny, between 2-4cm tall, and were an absolute and utter nightmare to make!

The Korean Biennale is a bit of a must-see for ceramic lovers. It’s like Disneyland for ceramicists! Apart from the amazing museums and mind-blowing exhibitions (truly some of the best ceramics I have ever seen in my whole life anywhere ever) there are also workshops, juicy conferences with speakers from all over the world, local ceramic markets, rock bands, glamorous women jumping out of life-sized ceramic jars, blindfolded potters throwing pots on the wheel in front of amazed crowds and all kinds of weird, wild and wonderful things going on! I spent 10 days at the 3rd Biennale and wish I was there again for this one! I came home with a suitcase full of beautiful ceramics, all wrapped up in lovely Korean textiles (which I had to buy to wrap the ceramics in my suitcase to stop them from breaking you see)! While there was a lot of fun and games there was also a serious side to it as well - lots of debate and discussion about the state of the ceramic arts, a really big focus on education and engaging the public in the medium, and an awful lot of quality contemporary international and Korean ceramics. It rocked my world! Unfortunately I didn’t take out the US$50,000 prize money. Yeah, a bit of a bummer that. There goes my early retirement plan….(and yes, that is me above pretending to be a Korean potter - how could I resist having a go at that!!!)

Cluck cluck cluck

This weekend I wore my Aunty Mel hat and spent the weekend with my four year old niece. She is the apple of my eye. I had been promising her a day in the studio for weeks, and we finally got around to it. I should have her trained up to do all my dirty work in no time! She was a natural! After a quick burl on the wheel she also proved a dab hand at slip casting and then got all crazy on the sculptures and made beautiful big blobs with knitting needles sticking out of them! Aaah…kiddies are so good at expressing themselves! It really is a marvel to watch.

More play

Kenji and I were talking earlier this year about wanting to become a little more playful with our work. It’s so easy to take it all too seriously. It all becomes about meeting deadlines and rushing things through kilns, and all the other million things we have to do to keep afloat, that sometimes you can forget about the importance of just playing with a material and playing with ideas. So we decided that this year we would try to make sure we get a bit more play in there, a bit of experimentation, without it having to be FOR anything other than our own indulgence. Often this is where the best new ideas come from anyway. This Little People Project has become an outcome of that discussion.

We worry a little that we are too easily amused, as we roll about laughing at a miniature porcelain figure trapped under a slab of butter (see below), but it’s surprising the number of offshoot ideas we have had as a result of these (seemingly frivolous and immature) exercises, and the number of interesting conversations that have arisen about perception and interpretation and scale and everyday objects. This week we took them to our local supermarket. Things got a bit hairy in the dairy aisle, but after a panadol and a quick lie down he was feeling much better.

Image Transfer on Clay

I got a nice surprise in the mail yesterday! Although this book came out months ago, my copy seems to have been circling the earth for a while, but has finally landed on my doorstep. I felt a bit fancy as I flicked through its glossy pages and found my shiny little image!! (that's me on the bottom right). It’s called Image Transfer on Clay (sexy huh), and has all kinds of cool techniques for – you guessed it – transferring imagery onto clay.

Speaking of which, I’m knee deep in decals today – designing and cutting and pasting and sticking. Every now and then my dear sweet computer gets a bit tuckered out, a bit weary, and decides to kick back and take its sweet time….it’s sweet sweeeeeeeeeeet time….and it always seems to happen just after I’ve had my morning coffee and am wired and ready to go! Grrrr. It’s like a little orchestra here in my office, a soundtrack of impatience and frustration as I groan and whine, drumming my fingers on the desk, while the computer hums and huffs and puffs and creaks and beeps its way along. But I shouldn’t complain – there’s days when I feel like that too.

Human Wonderland

Kenji has just posted the latest adventures of our little people. You can check it out here.

Blue Bird Bowl

Another little experiment. While I was kiln-less and unable to fire any new work, I dragged out a few old pieces that were packed away in boxes or half finished, and played around with them - slip sliding decals, cutting and pasting, just experimenting really. I've been working with decals for a few years now, and so have quite a stash of them, lots of little snippets and leftover bits and bobs crammed and stuffed into folders and envelopes in a big disorganised mess! Sometimes I like to get all those snippets out and just play around with them to find a way to use them up. Waste not want not I always say.
(slipcast porcelain bowl with decals, 7cm x 9cm)


OOOPS!! Damn!! About 15 minutes after posting that blue bowl, the photographic backdrop it was sitting on came unstuck from the wall, slid to the ground and took my little blue bowl with it! Bummer...I liked that little piece! Oh well, something you just gotta get used to in this business! I learnt that very early on! Onwards and upwards!

All Handmade

All Handmade Gallery is a beautiful little space in Waverley, Sydney. Helen Stephens, the gallery owner, has created a lovely ambience, where the sunlight streams in through the front window onto tables and shelves lined with handmade ceramics, and sometimes painting and textiles too. There are little drawers that hold a treasure trove of tiny works, and a wonderful and ever-changing selection of objects by Australian and international ceramicists. I'm part of an exhibition of jugs by 15 Australian based makers - Pru Venables, Patsy Hely, Gerry Wedd, Kenji Uranishi, Tony Warburton, Penny Smith and Louise Boscacci, to name a few - opening there next week. The show runs from April 24th until May 22nd, and the exhibition is being opened by architect Phillip Cox at 6pm April 24th. I won't be able to make it unfortunately, but hope some of you can!
(The image is one of the little jugs I made for this show, about 10cm tall, slipcast porcelain with decals).

I'm a machine

What a day. I’m feeling a bit dazed after hours and hours of sanding and glazing jug after jug after jug after wall tile after wall tile after plate after cup!! Aaaagh!!! I enjoy most of the processes of making, but some of them can be quite tedious and you really have to be in the mood!! Because I haven’t had a kiln for a while I’ve got mountains of work that needs firing, and I’ve had 2 whole uninterrupted days in the studio to tackle it! It’s been a bit daunting (I normally work with much smaller amounts!) but I went in gung ho today, on a mission to get it all done. Down into the dungeon I went, a bucket of water, wet and dry sandpaper, hairdryer (keeps things moving!), glaze and brushes, radio national, pot of tea and a stash of snacks to keep me going.

It can be quite meditative sometimes, repeating the process over and over again, concentrating for such long periods of time, getting lost in the motions. When I finish these kinds of days it feels like I’ve been underwater and have just come up for air. I get that slightly dazed and disoriented feeling you get when you go to the movies during the day and come out of the dark enveloping cinema into the unexpected daylight. Anyway, big firing tomorrow and I’m excited because I’ve gone from a micro-kiln shared between 3 people, to a huge spaceship all to myself. I can fire so much work ALL IN ONE GO!!! Seems like such a luxury! Makes me a bit nervous too…so much in one kiln. Fingers crossed all goes to plan….

Pins and Stitches

Two exhibitions, Object and Action: the mantra of the stitch and 50 Brooches have just opened at Craft QLD (on until 1st week of May). Loani Lee’s textile work (below) is just incredible – that woman has some serious patience – and the brooch show is full of beautiful and witty little creations by some very talented Australian jewellers. One of these talented folk is Anna Davern (aka the Davernator) who’s Lizzie and Phillip brooches (above) were the highlight of the show for me!

And while I’m on the topic of exhibitions, just a little reminder to anyone in Brisbane that the 20/20 exhibition opening is this Thursday night at the Museum of Brisbane from 6pm. Hope to see some of you there!