1.Tools are a major focus in this class. Though many things can be completed by hand tools are often necessary. In creating artwork what type of tools have you used? In using these tools how did they help your work along? Explain their function and purpose. (Ex. Pottery Wheel, aviation snips, Clay rib) I used many tools throughout the semester but some of the most important to me at least are a needle tool, wire clay cutter, modeling tool and the pottery wheel. The needle tool is used for mainly adding details to the piece. You can create lines, dots, or any kind of design to a piece. A needle tool is also helpful when "gluing" two section of a piece with each other. You can use the needle tool to scratch lines then all you have to do is add water and hold it together for a few seconds. A wire clay cutter is mainly used when cutting out large bricks of clay into smaller pieces. This tool is used pretty much every day in a sculpture class since we are always using clay, we need to divide and give out pieces to every students. A modeling tool is made of wood and is mainly used to smooth out a slab of clay or a clay piece. This tool removes any harsh edges or section to the piece, making it perfect and smooth to the touch. The final tool is the pottery wheel. To be honest, I still haven't perfected the pottery wheel, still trying to learn. One way or another, it's a very important due to the fact that it's a completely different way of creating a piece then hand on. There would be marks where you had to "glue" the pieces together in the pottery wheel. The pottery wheel is also perfect for trimming any piece, removing any rough edges and getting everything simply perfect to the touch. 2. How has your knowledge and understanding of tools changed since the beginning of the semester? Talk about your growth of understanding. In the beginning of the semester, I was clueless to any uses of these tools. I had no idea what most of these tools were to begin with. I never even heard of a ribbon tool, modeling tool, a needle tool, a wooden rib, loop tool, and so many more. Even when Ms. Sudkamps explained the function of the tools, I understood the definitions of these tools but I didn't understand the true function of these tools. In the beginning, I didn't understand how important and helpful these tools truly are until later on in the semester when I actually began to use them for myself. I learned how helpful a needle tool can be when adding small details to a piece such as creating fur lines to my galaxy bat for a more realistic look or simply combining two parts of a piece together. I learned how a helpful a drilling tool can be when I used for my sgrafitto sunflower piece. I used small drilling for the center of my sunflowers, creating a realistic look, as well as creating single dots throughout the entire piece. Before the beginning of these semester, I barely know what these tools were, even that they existed. Now, I understand exactly what they are for because I used them over and over throughout this entire semester. I have memories of being saved by these tools. I can feel their impact against my pieces and like a movie playing, I see myself using these tools against the smooth and soft clay of my own piece each time that I pick me up from where it rests in my house. 3. Which project was your most successful? Describe the theme and or topic and the process you went through to complete the project. In my opinion, my most successful project was my sgraffito sunflower mug. The reason that I think that it was the most successful is mainly due to emotional reasoning. I had tried to do this piece before in my Art I class. I tried to create a sunflower mug out of clay and failed miserably but with this unit, my mug was reborn just like the Phoenix, rising from its own ashes. Not only that, I was finally able to gift my mom with the mug that she has always deserved. I decided on sunflowers due to the fact that they are my mom's favorite flowers and a coffee mug because my mom is always drinking coffee. I begin this project like any other, by grabbing a large slab of clay. Once I got it to the perfect length, I took out measured pieces of paper that I had cut out and cut exactly what I needed. Next step, I had to use a needle tool and cut out the corners of the slab of clay. In a second, I added water and "glued" my piece together then I begin to work on the bottom of my mug. All I did is grab a piece of a paper and cut out exactly what I needed before doing the same to my slab of clay and combining the mug to its bottom. Next step, I had to simply wait for my piece to become leather hard before I could even begin to curve out my design. Although, before I could curve anything, I needed to add black underglaze to my piece. Once it was ready, I begin to curve with a curving tool with a triangle end well after I traced three sunflowers throughout the mug from a drawing of a sunflower that I got off the internet. I curve out my sunflowers in a matter of days, taking my time, making sure that it was simply perfect. I also made sure to leave a space between each petals. Before I was done, I used drilling tools for the center of my flowers for a more realistic look and dots around the sunflowers. The final two steps were firing it and covering it in clear underglaze for a shiny and beautiful look to my mug. 4. Which project was your least successful? Explain why you consider this work of art unsuccessful? If you were to create this project over, what changes would you make? I think my least successful piece was my first, the textured tripod cup. In this project, I made a tripod mug of a fish. Although, it was cute and the coloring was perfect, I did think that it looked like it was made by a ten year old. It was not very smooth, you could feel the rough edges throughout the entire piece to the point that I could cut myself. My piece's eyes was placed in different direction, giving it a cartoonist look . One of the fins was higher than the other but I simply told people that he was dancing. The worst part of the entire thing was that I didn't smooth it out properly meaning that you could where I added the eyes and fins. Instead of looking like that my fish was born of these pieces, it looked like it was added in last minute like a bad Frankenstein. All it was missing was the snitches through the entire thing. I do blame the fact that it was my project in this class and I hadn't worked with clay before except for once in Art I, which failed miserably. If I could redo the entire project, I would work on the small details. Removing any evidence that I added the pieces later on such as the eyes and the fins. Also I would make sure that the fins were placed in the same place and the same goes for the eyes. Instead of one higher than the other, I would have them perfectly placed. Also I would have color it over once again since that blue glaze fall against the green of the fins, it wasn't meant be there. Finally, I would have planned more my piece before actually creating; I would have went online and searched for examples of tripod mugs or pieces used to represent a fish. In general, I would like to recreate this piece now because now I finally understand what I am doing after months of practice. 5. Regardless of whether you liked or disliked a project, which one did you learn, grow, or developed the most from? Please explain. To be honest in order to answer this question, I have to talk about at least two pieces. The two pieces that I grow the most from was the textured tripod mug and the pit fire. The textured tripod mug due to the fact that it was the first project that I ever did involving clay. This project showed me exactly how clueless I was with anything involving clay. When doing this project, I asked a hundred of questions from the simplest thing to the hardest things. I had to ask how to how to combine two parts of a piece together. Even though, my piece, in my option, did failed, this was the piece that I learned the most from everything that I did throughout this semester. With this project, I learned from all the mistakes that I make from the misplaced eyes and fins to the rough and sharp corners. This was my worst piece and with this piece, I realized all my mistakes and promised myself that I would make these mistakes. I learned how to combine both of pieces together, smooth everything out, and how to use some of the tools such as the needle tools. I learned from the pit fire piece for the exact opposite reason. This was the first piece that worked or was simply successful to me. With these, I remember all the mistakes that I made with my last piece and simply did the opposite. I made sure to use a sponge to smooth everything out to the point of perfection as to not leave a rough sensation to the piece. I asked a million questions once again and made sure to follow each by the word. I perfection the technique of combining two parts of a piece together. Cut off the corner and scratch a hundred of lines with a needle tool before adding water. I used tools that I never thought of using before; I used a needle tool, a modeling tool, and an exo knife. I was finally able to make my piece look each section of the piece belonged to each other. The piece simply looked right and how I wanted. I think that the main reason that this piece helped me grow is because it showed me that I could do it, that I know what I was doing, mainly. Although, the piece wasn't perfect, it was enough for me to be confidence while my first piece, my fish, helped me by showing me just how much I needed to learn. One piece helped me by breaking me down while the other helped me by bringing me back up. Thank you for reading
Hoped you enjoyed and thanks for everything, Ms. Sudkamp
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This blog post is about the mosaic piece that I have been working on for the past things days. I originally had the idea for a illustrated Friday. The word was winter and at the time, I was finishing up my figurative piece and trying to come up with a idea for a mosaic. In a stroke of luck, I killed two birds with one stone; I came up with a idea for my illustrated Friday and for my mosaic. Also, I also love snowflakes so working with snowflake was simply perfect. In the end, I decided to design my piece the way I did because I wanted to do something different from the rest of my classmates. Everybody else was creating a mosaic with the main subject of their piece as well as the background so I decided to do something different. I decided to simply create a mosaic with the background and simply paint the snowflake. Also, to be honest, I was worried that I wouldn't be able to actually create the snowflake with broken piece of clay. I was worried that the pieces would bend or curve in the way that I needed to do so I simply decided to paint it instead. I thought the most difficult part of the piece was broken pieces for my background. This was the hardest part because I kept having to go back and forward to find the perfect piece for a blank space as well as having to break some piece to fit perfectly. I did find the look of the snowflake, itself, to be successful. This is done to the fact that I printed out a piece of paper with a drawing of a snowflake and simply trace it against the wooden board. If I could do this project again, I would plan out my pieces more. Instead of simply stealing from other people, I would have made my own from clay. One way or another, I truly enjoyed working this piece and I would create another mosaic if I have the chance. Thank you for reading Hoped you enjoyed!! Hi and welcome back!!
This week I am going to talk again about my sgraffito piece, a coffee mug craved in sunflowers and dots. I started this progress by stretching out a long piece of clay then taking out the measurements that I had beforehand and simply cutting it out. After a couple of failed attempts, I got it perfect. Next, I begin to glue the two ends of the clay together. I had to cut off the corners, scratch around the two areas and finally add a much of water as the glue. I had to hold the two end together for a couple of minutes. The next thing that I did is trace out a base for the bottom of my mug and glue it exactly how I did with the mug, itself. Once I had the mug built, I used a brush to smooth everything out and made it simply perfect then I simply had to wait. I had to wait until the mug was leather hard and once it was, I could paint it with black underglaze. I painted at least 4, maybe 5 times, to make sure that no strokes were visible against my mug. Once again, my mug had to dry and once it did, I begin to trace the sunflower pictures that I had printed beforehand from the internet. I traced three sunflowers around my mug. The tracing was done, I begin to carve with a carving tool and with that, my ordinary mug became a sgraffito. I traced the sunflower for about 2, 3, days before it was perfect. When I would trace the petals, I made sure to leave a line between each petals, providing a more realistic look to my piece. For a final touch, I used a drilling tool to create dots around the center as if it was a real sunflower. I also used a bigger drilling tool to add dots around the base of my mug, around the sunflowers. I finished off with covering a couple of smudged parts with black underglaze then I sent it to be fire. Once it came out, I coated in clear underglaze for shine and sent it to be fire once again. I though this entire project was really fun to do and I think the end results were simply beautiful from everyones that I seen from my classmates. I saw things from plates to mugs to vase to much more. The entire progress of sgraffito is simply beautiful to look at because the craving themselves leave this gentle and nearly perfect image. The progress of creating a piece of Sgraffito is simple so peaceful and calming to create; I could have spend hours craving out sunflowers around the base of my mug. The most successful part of my mug were simply the handler and the sunflowers themselves. I did the handler by copying a classmate, I created the handler by twisting two snake piece of clay together like it was a candy cane of clay. The handler ended up a little edgy but smooth just like I wanted it. The sunflowers, well, looked like flowers, which is exactly what I wanted from them and more then that, they looked like sunflowers; I couldn't have been happier. I created gentle and smooth sunflowers, they might not have been identical but they ended up pretty good if I do say so, myself. The only thing that I would change about my piece is I would have work more on the mug itself, curving it around the rim to look more curvy like a coffee mug and made it a less tall but other then that, I couldn't have been happier with my piece. Thank for you reading!! Hoped you enjoyed!! Hi and welcome back!!
This blog post is going to be about my most recent project of working with Sgraffito. I was inspirited by a past project that I tried to do back to when I was in Art I. I was working with clay for the first time and I wanted to create a gift for my mom. So I decided on the two things she loves most in the world, coffee and sunflower. I made her a coffee mug with sunflower piece that I crafted by hand, the only thing that it didn't turn out so good. I gave up on that present for my mom until Sudkamp brought up the idea of Sgraffito and as a light bulb went off, I return to a past idea. I begin by figuring out measurements and stretching out a long and thin piece of clay. It took a couple of tries but I finally got it right in the end. Next, I pinned the two ends of the clay together by cutting off the edges and scratching out lines before dripping it with water. Just like glue, my piece became one. I made a circular bottom and added to the piece. I brushed out the piece in order to smooth it out and make it simply perfect. Once that was done, I simply had to wait until it was leather hard and then the fun come truly begin. The second my piece became dry, I grabbed black underglaze and painted the entire thing from bottom to top to inside to the base at least 4 times until it was as perfect as I could get it to. Beforehand, I printed out some pictures of sunflowers and simply traced against my piece 3 times and next came the step that truly made my piece a sgraffito. With a carving tool, I begin to trace my sunflower leaving behind a little line between each petals. It took me a couple of days to finish the entire thing and before I was done, I decided to add tiny little dots throughout my piece with a drilling tool. The final step is to fire my piece and check to see if it adds more black underglaze then coated it with clear underglaze for shine. Thank you for reading!! Hoped you enjoyed!! Hi and welcome back!!
In this blog post, I'm going to talk about throwing on the wheel. The wheel is literally a wheel that spins as you step down on the button against your feet. The wheel spins like one of those spinning teacups at Disney. The speed can go from slow to fast to incredibly fast. It begin with simply throwing a slab of clay about the size of a fist in the center of the wheel. Slowly, drip water on the clay before slowly begin to spin the wheel. With your elbows at your knees and your hands cupped around the slab of clay like a warm mug of hot chocolate, you begin to spin in hope of centering the clay. This is the hardest part of the entire progress and take the longest. I was struck on this progress for the entire class period. The only step that I truly did in this progress was centering. I simply never got it right; it was never perfect, off center, too wet, or the worst of it is the clay would fall off. There was even a point that my piece of clay fall off into my pot of water, getting everything wet and dirty with clay. This was truly the hardest part of the progress and the only step that I truly reached. I spend the entire period on that single step and never got it right. Noting was successful for me at least, I have nothing to show for it this blog post. I don't have a photo of working on the wheel and I don't have a photo of a finished piece because I never made it through. The next step that would come after centering is placing both of my thumbs in the center and opening up the piece of clay. As I should have opened up the slab of clay, I would thin out the walls. Shaping the clay to look like a vase, a mug, or whatever piece I wanted to make. Next, I would rise the clay until reaching the height that I desire for the piece. Wetting it more and more but making sure not to drown it. The final step would be to trim the entire, removing any uneven corner and making the cylinder piece look as perfect as it possibly can. Although, it was somewhat of a fun process, it was very, very, stressful for me due to the fact that I could not get it right, center without having it fly off from the wheel or break in half as well as in the end, I had nothing to show for it. I do find the wheel to be successful in perfecting a cylinder slab of clay and trimming as well as long that you have the patient and time to get it just right. This is all for day Thank you and hope you enjoyed!! Hi and welcome back!! For my figurative piece, I decided to use clay instead of paper mache. I started this project by simply deciding on what I want to make and searching up photos for it. In the end, I decided on making a bat to be more specific a greater false vampire bat. I printed out four photos of my bat and got to work the next day. I grab a large piece of clay and round it into a big ball, making my head. I had to stick my finger through the center of my head in order to make it hollow and make sure that it doesn't explode once fired. Next I worked on the ears, which I would say was one of the biggest con of this entire piece. The ears were a con or simply difficult to make because the shape that I had to make them was big and they ended up really heavy. Meaning that when I added the ears to the head and tried to work on another section of the piece, the ear would crack and fall off the piece. I had to add the ear to the head at least 3 time before Sudkamp had the idea of cutting the ears off and adding them in the end after I was done with something else done. If I could have done it differently, I would have added the ears at the very end, making the process so much less stressful. Next thing, I did is work on the top and bottom jaw. It took me a long time to get the jaws just right but I did in the end, with a longer top piece and short bottom piece. Once I added them, I also noticed a lot of cracking from the bottom jaw. This part of the jaw was a con from the piece because I had to keep smoothing it out. I probably should have added at the end with the ears, it might have made things easier. The next part that I worked on was the eyes, which was really easy. I think that I did a pretty good job on the eyes themselves. I made a ball out of clay then cut it in half and added details with cap of a pen. This pen helped me create the lids beneath and top of the actual eye as well as the iris of the eye. The only thing that I had to do was smooth out the lids so it looked a little more separated from the eyes. I think that I did really good job on the eyes. Next, I worked on the fur of my bat. I simply used the back of a paint brush, adding slight lines or fur to the my bat and leaving some part alone that only had skin. I think that the look of the fur was one of the best part of my bat because it just made the bat real. Also, the adding of the teeth really helped with the making of my piece. I didn't add all the parts right away because Sudkamp told me that it might be easier to glue in the back teeth in the end. I simply added four teeth to the front of the jaw, two on the top and two on the bottom. Now, I am done, just waiting for my piece to be fired and then I can paint it and add the back teeth. The best part that I did on the piece were probably the fur and teeth and the hardest were ears and jaw, just because they kept cracking. This was a really fun project and I really love my piece; I can't wait to have my bat against one of my book shelf, scaring off my family and my dog to death. A couple of weeks passed and I added more details to my piece once it was fired. I added acrylic paint instead of glaze or water color. I added black for a base before I got the idea to make a galaxy bat like I'm previously wanted. I mixed up some red and blue to create a purple then dotted some purple to the side as well as bright blue. For the final look, I spilled some white throughout my bat, creating stars to my galaxy theme. My piece was very successful for it ended up looking like a realistic bat with a galaxy theme. I truly love my piece and will treasure it forever in my book shelf. Everything in the end ended up looking exactly how I wanted it to. Thank you for reading and hoped you enjoyed!! Hello and welcome back!!
Today I am going to talk about my finished pit fire piece. The progress of creating my piece begin with clay, which I used coil to create my box and its lid. Then I let it dry before beginning the actual pit fire progress. This progress began with covering it with an acid called ferric chloride before wrapping it with other objects that I brought to burn it. I brought eggs shells, hair, and dog food but I actually used in my piece is some of the egg shells, dog food, two different type of salt, the ferric chloride, and two long piece of black wire. The ferric chloride was used to create a red orange color, the wires was there to add black as well as dog food for a black and brown color, and the acid that we sprayed at Sudkamp's house was there to add blue. The egg shells were there to create a unique pattern. Once I had everything around my piece, I wrapped it around a yellow piece of paper then aluminium foil. Next step of this progress is the actually burning, where we did at Sudkamp's house and once it cool down, Sudkamp brought it to school. We ended the progress of pit fire here after I covered it in spray scealer for the shine. I think that in general I was successful in the general shape and texture of my piece, which ended up pretty smooth and box like exactly like I wanted. I also did well in the general covering of my piece, which is completely covered. The only thing that I would do again is the general coloring of my piece. I wanted more color to my piece; it ended up too brown for my taste. I wanted to have more red, blues, and bright colors throughout my piece. I noticed that some people sprayed some normal paint around their piece before firing. If I could have done it again, I would have added some paint to my box. I also would have put more egg shells around my piece in prder to create more of a pattern throughout and perhaps less dog food to get rid of that dark brown color. Overall, I like my piece and I enjoyed the pit fire progress. I would definitely do it again if I have the chance. Thank you for reading and hoped you enjoyed!! Hi and welcome back
This blog post is about the paper mache that I been working on with my table. The people that I am working with are three girls and their names are Kelsey B, Danai K, and Yamileth. Everyone in my group pretty much done every step of this project at least once. We started this project by researching pictures and types of butterflies and bringing the the photos to school. In the end, we decided on two of my pictures. Next, we had to cut out the basic shape of our butterflies from cardboard and Danai and I did that on the first day because the other girls weren't there for the first day. The second day, Kelsey, Yamileth, and I cut out the next butterfly. The next step is to begin covering the cardboard, which we did with aluminum foil on every piece of our butterflies before coating with flour and water dripped in paper. That took the longest time because we made one of our wings of our butterfly way too big, which led to the biggest difficulties from this project. The general size of our butterfly was way too big making our wings take twice as long as everyone else. If I could redo the project again, I would have made the wings at least twice as small. However, it's okay because we only had to make one butterfly. Right now, we are in the progress of finishing up the coating of one wing, letting the body, and sandpapering the other wing as well as painting it. The next thing that we need to do is glue the body to the wings and paint everything. The successes that we had with the project is generally the overall appearance of our butterfly because the wings have a very realistic appearance of a butterfly wing. We have a slight indent on the side of the wings that I think looks very realistic to the real wings. Thank you for reading and hoped you enjoyed Hi and welcome back!
Today, we are going to talk about my pit fire project while it's in the process of getting finished. The process that I used to create my piece is coil. Meaning that I simply begin with rolling out a piece of clay and then pressing a piece of green paper against the clay with the measurements I needed before finally cutting it out. I cut out five pieces in total; in the start, all the pieces were 5 by 4 inches but I had to cut out my bottom piece in half in order to get it in there. Next, I smooth out the pieces with a wet sponge on both sides and allowed it to dry with the help of hair dryer after a bit. Once it was dry enough to stand up on it's own, I begin to glue and slip my pieces together. Scratching out lines on the sides of my pieces before adding some slip in order to pinned it to the base and sides. Once I able it to dry before starting to work on the top of my box and its handler. I simply added some water on the top of my unfinished drying box and pressed it against my paper before cutting it out. However, this didn't work very well for me because I never added enough water so the imprint never came out just right. This lead to the biggest problems that I had with this piece, which is getting the measure just right. I had to redo the bottom and the top mainly because I did by eye or some how messed up on the measurement in general. The other biggest problem that I had is with cracking; toward of my side, I think that I didn't glue just right, having done it at the last minute before the bell rang. It simply didn't set right, leading to problems. However, I do think that my box is successful in its final look because it is pretty identical and spaced out enough to make a decent box for my room. I also think that I am doing a pretty good job on smoothing everything out and smoothing it with a metal spoon in order to get that beautiful pottery shine. I still not done with my box, I still have to finish smoothing it out with a spoon, finish up the top of the box and slip and glue the handler to the top of the box. My design hasn't really changed, it pretty much identical to the one I drew out except for the measurement that I had to change in order to make it work. I don't plan on changing anything that I first plan out; right now, I am simply finishing up what I started. Thank you for reading and hoped you enjoyed! |
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January 2019
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