Here is a real "One with Clay, Image and Text" chimera, which I'm posting celebratorily. Just a few hours ago I was accepted into The Village Gallery, a cooperative art gallery in the Village of Oak Creek, and walking distance from where I am living now! I'm really happy and excited about that! One thing that acceptance means is that I'll be making a lot more vessels...like these...
Easy and fun: 1) Make a vase on the potter's wheel. 2) Let it dry to a leather hard state. 3) Take a sharp X-acto-esque blade to it, evenly but not overly so. 4) Bisque fire the pieces. 5) Glaze the pieces, and arrange them playfully. The glaze will fuse the pieces together, and you will have something like what you see here. (The glaze in this case is Majolica white.) Try it--it's a blast!
To wrap up the week with a real weirdy, here is one from 2009. Drawing, photo-editing, and an odd pun-laden triple acrostic that reads: DOGMA? ‘TIS M here from Delhi/Eff air-or rare Fahrenheit/LONG-GONE Arnold Fonzarelli/Ucked his last from Kryptonite/Set your sails w/Tucks & Taels
What does it all mean? I don’t rightly know, though I must have when I made it. Perhaps the ghost of Jean-Michel Basquiat could help us. I get some enjoyment from no longer knowing, though; and yet more enjoyment from seeing the unexpected visual zing of an early color inversion experiment.
Here is one of the hundreds and hundreds of vessels I have made using a potter's wheel. Wheel mastery did not come easily for me, since I am clumsier than the average bear. I'm proud that I persisted to the point that I can call myself a potter.
When I was growing up most people who had tattoos were former military or otherwise living on the edge. Maybe more people are living on the edge now?
The tattoos drawn here were drawn from my improvisational imagination. Do they ring true or false?
As of this writing I am myself untattooed, but you never know.
Here is a portrait of my Uncivilly Disobedient Uncle Paul, done two years ago while I and my brother Brian were houseguests of his. Today is his 83rd Birthday.
My friend Karen W. provided the photo source for this drawing of a photogenic yet invasive pest of the Gulf of Mexico. This makes the second Fish entry in as many days, but it is not a trend.
Here is the text of the acrostic: Periwinkles otter twinkles Ain’t Bea wrinkles–sweet/Perturbations of the ether tell the wormhole’s trait/Pacifiers paltrifying worry-warts–not great/Endothermic flareups make a Harper’s day complete/Egomania occludes–don’t hire an old comptesse/Axes grind these systems down–they injure on that basis/Antifreeze your quaint chagrin to ease homeostasis/Artificiality still creeps in nonetheless
Questions? Comments? Denunciations? All are welcome.
My hope is that weekly or oftener I’ll post one of my creative works or works-in-progress, and keep myself energized and growing as an artist/poet. Time will tell.
One with Clay, Image and Text 