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Behind the scene. Watch the creation of these magical sculptural vessels!

Thursday, December 10, 2015

My guest blogger is Antonina. She is a pottery artist. I was so happy when she agreed to show how she creates her vessels! They are magical!

Enjoy!
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Hello to all who stopped by to see what is happening in my workshop! I am going to show you how I create my vessels. Let's start with a teapot. I use clay that is quite plastic. There are large pieces of grog in it, though. Grog is the particles of the clay that has been baked already. They are added to the raw clay to increase the traction. This clay mixture is perfect for my pottery designs.

I had two pieces of clay. The bigger piece is already made into the teapot's bottom half. The smaller piece is about to become the teapot's top half.


Here are both halves of the future teapot. You can see my finger imprints on them for now. Later they are going to be carefully smoothed out. Sometimes it is worth it to keep them, as this is how the vessels made by hand can be distinguished from those that have been made on a wheel.


Here you can see that both halves are attached together with the slurry (Slurry is a thin sloppy clay mud) and the teapot's shape has been modified by now. You can see that the teapot's lid has been cut off too. I got carried away with the process and forgot to take more pictures while I was doing that. 


Here you can see the holes for the tea laves and the attached handle.



I added an inside barrier inside the lid:


And here it is, brand new raw hero of my story. It is only half way done! Now it needs to dry thoroughly. Then I will paint it, bake it twice in a kiln... if I am lucky and do not brake it... and if it does not crack while being baked at 1900 degrees... it will be all finished!


The teapot is in the kiln, so let's make a mushroom jewellery box!

It all starts just like this:


I start kneading it. This is the grog clay again. I love it as it keeps the shape well. 


Continue to knead and stretch it to get the desired shape. Many vessels look pretty much the same at this stage.


The desired shape has been achieved. Now I need to do some work on the inner and the outer surface.



The lid is ready. I have all the parts for the mushroom stems (wire and the clay rolls)



I cut out the mushroom caps from a rolled piece of clay.


The mushroom's cup is ready:


Here is one mushroom:


And here is the whole composition:


This is how it looks after it has been baked in the kiln (nice and white): 



It is all finished:


Wishing a nice day to all!

Antonina
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