Monday, November 20, 2017

Once a Claywoman, Always a Claywoman!

In my neck of the woods, Autumn and Thanksgiving traditionally mark the beginning of our annual local Holiday Arts & Crafts Fair Season! Although I have participated as an exhibitor on more occasions than I can recall, the past few years I have merely been relegated to the sidelines as a spectator. In an attempt to encourage a creative friend who had little confidence that anyone would ever want to buy her wares, I set out to entice her with an offer to step out of retirement to share a space. We chose a local venue that allowed "booth sharing" and with a few months to prepare, we set out to create our individual inventories! 

I made the decision to produce one of my time tested creations... porcelain Christmas ornaments, small affordable pieces that always seem to catch the eye of passers by, if for no other reason than to stop & smile at what they see! Even after 30 years, these small but unique sculptures seem to speak out loud & ask to be seen!! Several years ago I created an entire sculpture series titled Hedounies... they were larger single & multiple figure sculptures that I sold in galleries and art shows for many years before putting them into retirement!   When it came time to brush off my clay table and get to work, I set out to bring life to a new generation of ornaments called Treedounies I was definitely out of practice and felt a bit rusty, but for better or worse, I loved every minute of feeling porcelain on my fingertips once again! 

The first two photos have been retrieved from my archives to give you an idea of what my Hedounies looked like... I didn't have any other digital photos so this is the best I could provide at this time... the 1st one, titled "What's Up?" measured approx. 14" in height and the 2nd one, titled "What's New?" measured approx. 10" tall X 12" long. Both were created from porcelain and airbrushed with underglazes before being sprayed with a crystal clear glaze top coat.
 

Well, enough of my little walk down memory lane!

The following photos are an assortment of some of my latest Treedounies... each ornament is created from porcelain and finished with air brushed underglazes and a matte finish.

Treedounie Bells - the clapper in the open bottom is a jingle bell
 
Treedounie Ornaments - size varies, approx. 2 1/2" to 3"

So... in the end, the show was a success... my friend's work was well received and she sold enough to encourage her creative juices to keep flowing!! The most important thing of the day, we had fun!! 

Once again, thank you for stopping by...
Until next time, Happy ARTing!!