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I had a three and a half day weekend this weekend, which was nice. I got quite a bit done, but nothing in the studio. Instead it was a weekend of getting outside, taking care of animals, house work and playing with motorcycles. I also spent some time just hanging out with my wife and son; something I don't get to do enough of.

Today was especially good as I got some eggs pickled (the chickens are producing an abundance of shelled goodness) and got bread baked. I also got our microwave fixed; a chore that has been hanging over my head for quite some time now. Things are looking up in the kitchen.

Another high point of today was getting the motorcycle (Hank) running. Oh I wouldn't say that he runs well by any means, but at least I can get him started. The plan now is to get him a seat (he is lacking that essential component), get him licensed (another missing component that the government thinks is important) and get him a good tune up. Hopefully I can get these things accomplished pretty soon as I have been hankerin' to get out on two wheels. I would have been able to take Oscar (the smaller bike) out, but I think I fried an electrical component messing with the battery. So it goes.
The ultimate plan is to get one bike running decent so I can ride it while I tear down and rebuild the other one. Do I know how to build a motorcycle? No. Do I even know how to work on engines and such? No. Am I going to let that stop me from wasting large amounts of time and money trying? No.

Now, as far as pottery goes (this is supposed to be a pottery blog after all), not really a lot happening. In late January/early February the art club at school was making ceramic pendants for a festival at the school. We made them pretty quickly with a variety of bisque stamps the school had on hand (sorry, no pictures of these). Despite being free they did not go over very well (folks were more taken with the henna "tattoos" we were also doing), but I did enjoy making them. I don't know that it is something I would want to do a lot of on my own, but it might be a fun distraction every once in a while. And it could be a nice little something I could throw in for lagniappe.

I did get a chance to sgraffito a couple mugs...
Oh! Side note: I got a new spray gun for spraying slips and glazes! Perhaps after I have used it a little more I will do a little review post.
...The first of these I made for myself. I make hundreds of pieces and ocassionally keep seconds, but rarely if ever do I make things specifically for my own use. Oh sure, I make stuff for my wife from time to time, but never something just for me. So finally last week (or some time, I really don't remember) I up and made myself a mug.

Rob's owl mug - side A

Rob's owl mug - side B

Apparently I was working on this mug at the same time Ron Philbeck was working on his fantastic owl and branch yunomis (check them out here and here). He got his posted first, though, so now I look like some kind of Johnny-come-lately. Oh well; maybe I will just call it a Philbeck cover pot (you know, like a song cover but with pots).

The funny thing is that when I was deciding what kind of decoration to put on my mug it ended up being exactly the kind of decoration I have been wanting to do on all my work. I think I mentioned a while back about wanting my work to be more narrative instead of just decorative, and I think that is how these mugs turned out. Or at least it is a step in that direction.

This mug is the Bomb!

You can still see the pencil marks on this one where I was playing around with the final design. I decided to go with just one skull bomb though and suggest the others with the dotted drop lines. I was thinking the lines might look good with some luster embellishment. I forget what color the slip is, though, so I don't know if it would work. (Don't ask me what the imagery means because I have no idea.)

Now the problem is finding a clear glaze that is not going to distort the images. The one I have been using has a tendency to run and smear the sgraffito images a bit. Not a big deal with the more abstract, decorative designs, but I think these would need to be more crisp to be effective. Actually I am not sure if that is due to the glaze or the slip. Either was a bit of testing is in order.

Ok; unfortunately I have to go to school tomorrow, so I better knock off.

-Rob

Post Script - Goats! More on that later...

Starting summer with the sound of crying

It has been a while since I posted anything on here, so a quick recap of what has been going on in the merry old land of Rob.

From June 7th to July 2nd I was teaching summer enrichment classes at the high school I work for. These were not really a big deal, just something to keep the kiddies busy and out of trouble for a while. There were three classes a day, each class lasting 2 hours. Personally I thought 2 hours was a bit long for each class considering most of the participants were incoming freshmen and had the attention span of...well, freshmen. I was teaching three classes: a drawing class, an illustration class and a ceramics class. While they were not terrible and the extra money was nice; these classes mainly served as a reminder as to why I do not want to teach anymore.

During that time I did manage to get some stuff done in the studio. My wife wanted a piggy bank for a friend of hers. Not having much time to sculpt a traditional piggy bank I went with this type of bank instead. This is not, however, what she had in mind, so I guess they will be finished and put up for sale some time. I did enjoy making them, though, and if I can get rid of these I will probably make more. Along that line, what are everyone's thoughts on putting a hole in the bottom of the bank to retrieve the money? I have a hole in the bottom of these, but it seems that I could save myself the trouble of finding stoppers and making sure they fit right by making the hole on top a little bigger. Not huge, mind you, but big enough to get the money out relatively easily. Thoughts?

I have also been playing around with bowl forms, trying to find one that I like. I think I finally got one; now I just need to work on throwing it consistently.


A short time ago I also purchased another motorcycle. I have a Honda 450 (Oscar), which runs decent and such; but I quickly outgrew it and was looking for something bigger. Lo and behold, I stumble across a Yamaha XS850 Special. It is an 850, so it is a good step up from the 450. It has a nice big 6 gallon gas tank, good for long hauls. And it has an interesting 3 cylinder set up (as opposed to most bikes with 2 or 4), which I thought was cool.

Sure, it needs a little work, but for $400 it was hard to pass up. So slowly over this summer (and probably into the winter) I am going to be giving it a good working over to get everything in proper running order. I do not have a name for it yet, so any suggestions there would be welcome.

And finally, what has been eating up most of my time lately is this.

A week and a half ago my wife quite unexpectedly went into labor 4 weeks early. Thus on June 27 at just past noon our first child (Noah) was born. Pretty cool stuff. Even though he was a month early, he was fine. No stay in the NICU or anything. They watched him for a few hours in the nursery to make sure he was breathing ok, but then he stayed with us in the room until we went home. Noah has been getting a good deal of my attention as of late, so I have not been in the studio in a while. I am going to try to get in there later today, though, to get some teapots started. Now, however, I think Noah needs his diaper changed. Ah the joys of fatherhood.

Tschus.
-Rob

Bad Motor-scooter Part 2

Since I know everyone has been sitting on the edge of their seats waiting to see what the results are, I present to you...the bike! Oscar (the bike's name is Oscar, the truck behind him is Rudy) was recently stripped of his factory finish and given a new paint job. He doesn't look too bad with the side panels and everything on there. Honestly, though, I liked it better when the tank was down to the bare metal. Oh well.
I also put on a new drive chain before taking him out on the road. That improved the performance quite a bit. The next step is to take a trip up to St. Louis and talk my younger brother into helping me clean the carburetors.

I have been working on some bowls that will become batter bowls in the near future. I threw a couple tonight, but neglected to bring the camera out, so no pictures yet (I just love keeping everyone waiting, it's how I make sure you all come back). Luckily we have off school this Friday for Easter break, so I will be able to get down to it for two full days before family stuff on Sunday.
Oh! And would you like to hear something funny? Not really laugh out loud funny, but more of a hit yourself in the head with a hammer funny. I was disappointed, but not surprised at not being able to go to NCECA. I especially wanted to go to the Making Through Living, Living Through Making pre-conference, so I was very excited to learn that they would be streaming it live on the web. I still had to work, but figured I could catch a little bit of it during lunch and such. When lunch rolled around I got my pb&j and hunkered down in the break/conference room ready for some good time pottery fun. I log on to the computer, find the web site and boom; there's the video! Sweet! Now I can enjoy a cool 30 minutes away from the kiddos watching some great potters do their thing. After a second though, I notice there is a problem...the computer doesn't have any sound! Sure I can see the great things they are doing, but when they stop to answer a question or explain something I cannot hear all the great things they are saying. Once again my plans are foiled...

Bad Motor-scooter

I have been spending a lot of time outside the studio because of track (I don't know if I have said on here before that I am an assistant track coach, pole vault). I am planning to step that back a bit, though, only coaching a couple days a week. There have been other projects as well, however. The biggest of which is this.

This is the 1982 Honda CM450e that I purchased a couple years ago. Up until three days ago it was the factory maroon in color. This weekend I spent almost two full days sanding it down to the bare metal. I really dig how the bare metal looks, but will be painting it; it doesn't look as good with the seat on it.

The seat covers the back fender too much. So the tank and side covers will be painted olive drab, which goes a bit deeper and a bit brighter with the clear coat on it. There will also be a black star on the side of the tank. Of course I may strip all that off again later if I decide I don't like it. I will do this for sure if I ever get a smaller seat. Obviously this is a project that will be going on for quite some time.


On the clay front I have been pumping out some mugs and such. These were photographed promptly after getting handles, and blogger then just as promptly turned the picture on its side. Why does it do that?

And here is one of a pair of planters (left) and a stack of very small bowls. The bowls were tests to fine tune the form. They each have a tallish trimmed foot that you cannot see due to their stacked nature. As such they remind me of a small set of stacked forms I did in college that had a similar shape...I wonder what ever happened to those.

And now I am off to put one more coat of primer on the bike's tank before I go to bed. More to come in the future. Tschus.

-Rob

post script - along with the motorcycle theme, check out Jesse Irwin's Motorcycle Don't Run Blues. Great stuff.