These are new pieces I took to the Mississippi show. For these pieces I made carved bisqued stamps of dogwood flowers and cherry blossoms. The pink glaze has been one I have been testing from my series of tests of mason stains. I love the color. I hate the application of painting it on in layers. I prefer to dip or pour glazes on my pieces. This glaze will just not work properly when done that way. Very temperamental cheeky glaze!
When you look at these pieces what you are seeing is the culmination of several different expeditions into new clay territory for me. The first is the making of the stamps. I had to create those and fire them before I could make these platters.
The second was the glaze color expedition. That has been ongoing for about a year and a half.
No, I didn't work on these things 24-7 but they were done in between the regular work I create for shows, custom orders and wholesale work.
I call this experimental work "expeditions" because it really is like an adventure into unknown territory with unknown barriers to encounter, unknown results and possibly partial to total failure.
It takes courage and perserverance to make artwork.
It takes guts to continue to experiment and weather the storms the adventure may bring.
So, while these themes and images are very "pretty" and "delicate", underneath is sweat and tears and an endurance that sometimes borders on the edge of craziness.
