Mittens - April 2012

After the success of the bootee, I then knitted two mittens from the same knitting pattern. I threaded one with a ribbon at the wrist and the other I threaded with a small knitted plait. These were then dipped in the slip in the normal way. I painted the ribbon with a copper oxide and slip mixture to contrast with the  whiteness of the bone china. I decided to glaze these with a transparent gloss glaze to compare them with the matt finish of the bootie. Normally you would bisquet fire first, then glaze, then fire up to stoneware. However, because the items are so fragile, I decided to try a 'raw firing', putting them in the kiln only once and taking them up to stoneware temp.

It was a risk firing the mittens straight up to s/w with a transparent glaze on, however, they survived, The risk is that they could explode in the kiln, thereby damaging other pieces. The reason they survived is because they're very thin and 'fit' the adjustment of a glaze to a clay.

I am very pleased with how the mittens have come out. I quite like the glaze on the surface as it doesn't take anything away from the texture of the wool or the pattern. Adding a glaze also increases the strength slightly as it increases the thickness of the surface. It also fills some of the holes in between the stitches making the surface more robust.

I particularly like the mitten with the ribbon as I like the addition of the copper oxide. It helps to define the ribbon from the rest of the mitten. I'm not as keen on the plaited cord that I made. The downside is that the oxide has run into the wool part of the mitten and i didn't want that. I can add the oxide to the ribbon and then thread it into the mitten. However, having tried this, the oxide falls off when threading it through the holes of the mitten. In conclusion I think I just need to be more careful when painting on the oxide..

Knitting pattern - April 2012

 I have scanned the knitting pattern I have been using as I am really interested on the different fonts and texts used within the pattern. The knitting pattern is a bit like a secret language, unless you know how to read the abbreviations  and quirky language.

I like this idea of a 'secret code' and would like to work with these ideas further..

Artists to research:

Tracey Emin - baby things
Amy Houghton - animation of unpicking a baby's matinee jacket
Clare Twomey - memory, permanence, impermanence
Neil Brownsword - ideas surrounding lost pottery industry in Stoke
Phoebe Cummings - transition, passing of time, relics, fragility, audience interaction

Old photos - April 2012

Following on from a tutorial, I looked at old photos of me wearing knitted baby clothes:

At my christening with my Aunt and Uncle

With my Mam

Outside our house

At my Gran and Grandad's house

A red & white knitted set that my Gran knitted for me. 

It had a matching hat, cardigan and even trousers!

I am quite interested in these images and am wondering if I can use them with text from the patterns using printing techniques ...

Knitting and bone china - March 2012

I was very pleased with how the 3ply sample was replicated in bone china and so decided that the next step would be to knit an item and then to cast that in bone china. I decided to knit a bootie from the Sirdar pattern 298, dated 1968 as it was one of the smallest items.

I think this is a lovely little object; one that we just don't see anymore. The pattern is a nice one as there are contrasting stitches within the garment - garter stitch on the foot and the lacy stitch on the ankle.

This is the bootie after being dipped in bone china slip. I squeezed out the excess slip so that the detail wasn't 'drowned' by the slip. I packed the bootie with dry paper so that it would keep it's shape whilst drying and firing. Once completely dry it was fired to stoneware temp (1280'c).

The bootie after firing

Amazingly, the bootie survived the firing and came out in one piece. However, it was extremely fragile and on handling, part of the ribbon broke off. I like this fragility though... it ties in very well with the notion that such items are now fragile relics from the past, fragile memories. The bone china has become a fossilised version of the knitted garment.

It's worth saying that it is not a good idea to put man-made fibres in the kiln as they produce horrible fumes when burning. I am looking for a natural alternative yarn..

February 2012 Ceramicists using knitting

Helen Martin

Australian ceramic artist who combines knitting and crochet with ceramics. She uses SHINO glazes to gain the fine detail she requires:

Helen Martin Sweet Suite 1 detail 2009 Glazed knitting

Helen Martin Sweet Trio 2009 Glazed knitting

Helen Gilmour

I like the delicate texture of these pieces. The base of the bowls were thrown whilst the rest are knitted. She dips her pieces in either stoneware or porcelain slip then sprays on a glaze:

Tiziana Bendall-Brunello

I really like this artist's work which is cast in porcelain slip. She is influenced by Italian Renaissance sculpture and she accentuates the folds of children's garments. She is interested in representing the human body and it's movements, even though the body isn't present anymore. I like the fragility of these pieces, particularly the little shoes.

Tiziana Bendall-Brunello: Bowed dress 1999

Baby shoes 1999 porcelain

Five pairs of shoes.

January 2012 Ceramics and knitting

Amongst the things my Mam gave me from her clear out was some baby knitting patterns dated from the 60's and 70's. They were for layettes that you just don't see anymore as they're not fashionable anymore. Also, less people can knit now compared to my Mam's generation. My Mam taught me to knit but I don't know many people my age who can also knit. Having said that, there has been a resurgence in ladies 'of a certain age' who want to learn. Stitch and bitch groups have become popular, but such skills are not being passed down from mother to daughter as they once were.

This brings to mind Richard Slee's piece 'Sausage' which was about the 'death of the male DIYer. But it was also about skills that weren't being passed down from fathers to sons anymore.

I thought I'd do some test pieces, knitting samples from the patterns to be cast in porcelain and bone china slip. It's about nostalgia, theses patterns and skills are a piece of my history and my family's history, a celebration of a craft that was taken for granted. People knitted and sewed as there wasn't the availability of such items that there is now, and people had less money to spend. I still knit babies blankets for friends and they say that it's much nicer to receive a gift that has been hand made than something bought from a high street shop.

I like the idea of casting such items in porcelain. They become something else, like fossils or like the old fashioned figurines that my grandparents collected.

A 3 out of 3 pattern made with cotton double knitting yarn

The fired porcelain version of the blue sample - 

the detail wasn't replicated very well, I think the slip was too thick and also, the sample has stretched and lost it's shape.

Knitted sample made with Indian craft cotton, thicker than DK.

Cast white sample in porcelain slip - 

Again, the detail of the stitches wasn't captured very well as the slip was too thick.

Sirdar snuggly 3 ply

I wasn't sure if this would absorb the slip as it is composed of man-made fibres, no cotton at all. The pattern used was similar to the previous one but consisted of 5 rows of pattern.

As the slip was too thick with the previous samples, I added a deflocculant to the slip which helps to suspend the clay particles in the liquid.

Above sample soaked in bone china slip -

the sample absorbed the slip very well. The slip was of the correct fluidity/viscosity so the fine detail of the stitches has been picked up.

Fired bone china sample - 

I'm really pleased with how this sample came out. The wool and pattern were both very fine so I am pleased that the bone china has captured this.

Painting

I thought that I would just do ceramics for my MA  but recently I have been thinking about painting again. I'm not sure if it  will be part of my MA at the moment but I have begun working on a large painting of the sea. I am interested in capturing the movement and texture of the sea, particularly waves, based on photos that I took in Thailand. While I was working on my annotated bibliography, I found that I just 'needed' to paint so I went and bought a large canvas and went about painting it. I haven't managed to complete it yet but I made a start by laying down a thin wash of oil paint on to the canvas surface. My painting will eventually be based on a very close-up photo of a crashing wave. I wanted to add texture onto the surface of the canvas so I mixed sand with PVA glue and applied it to part of the surface where the crest of the wave would be.

Gerhard Richter 'Panorama' exhibition

I thoroughly enjoyed this exhibition at the Tate. I had been meaning to go but the fact that it finishes on January 8th encouraged me to go and join the German crowds. I had looked at Richter's work before when I was looking at visual impairments and ways of distorting or obscuring images. I found his method of blurring paint very interesting and I looked at his painted photographs as a way of obscuring my paintings for my FMP. He is an interesting painter because he considers both the capacities of painting as well as it's limitations. He questioned Duchamp's thoughts on the incapacities of painting and produced his own version of 'Nude descending a staircase' with his painting of 'Ema (Nude on a staircase) 1966:

Marcel Duchamp 'Nude Descending a Staircase No. 2' 1912

Gerhard Richter ' Ema (Nude on a Staircase) 1966

Richter has produced a diverse range of paintings; many are based on photographs, although he has produced a lot of large abstract canvases. I wanted to know why he started blurring his paintings and discovered it was to show the materiality of paint and to show a sense of movement that can be expressed in photographs.

There were many paintings in this exhibition but here are a few which caught my eye, for various reasons:

Curtain III (Light) 1965

I liked the composition of this painting, it could have been abstract but for the bottom of the painting that gave the subject away. This painting reminded me of Alison Watt's work that I looked at last year - beautiful, massive canvases depicting white fabric.

Seascape (Sea-Sea) 1970

I thought this a clever painting, even though Richter was producing paintings from photos, this painting looks rather abstract in that one has difficulty working out that the top half of the painting is in fact sea and not sky as one would expect. It inspired me to continue with a painting of a wave that I have begun.

Detail (Brown) 1970

I am really interested in small details and getting up close to objects and photographing them. For this reason I liked this painting. Although it looks quite ordimary, I like the fact that Richter took close-up photos of his paintings and made more paintings from these detailed shots.

Room 6 (Exploring Abstraction) was full of very large and brightly coloured abstract paintings. However, I was very much drawn to the small portrait on wood panel of his daughter. I thought it technically brilliant in it's small understated way:

'Betty' 1977

The paintings in Room 9 (18 October 1977) were based on the mysterious deaths of former Nazis on 18 October 1977. All were in shades of gray and varied in terms of blurredness. I was particularly drawn to 'Hanged':

'Hanged' 1988

The painting is based on police photographs of the event. I find this ghostly image very moving, it is very obscured so that the viewer only sees a hint of the subject. Very clever.

September, 2005

I wrote one word in my notes when I saw this painting - 'awesome'. Because I have lived in New York, I feel an affinity with the city . When the twin towers were attacked I just stared at the TV all day, it was hideous. I think this painting is a powerful interpretation of a horrific event.

I'm pleased I went to see this exhibition as I nearly missed it. There has been a lot of discussion in our work-in-progress seminars recently about the future of painting. Having seen this exhibition, I think that painting still has a lot to 'say' in the visual arts and will continue to play an important part in contemporary art. It has inspired me to carry on painting.

Contemporary Ceramic Artists using surface texture in their work

I came across the ceramic artist Natasha Lewer when I went to the BlindArt exhibition in Banbury. The exhibition had been designed for people with visual impairments and the work on display was by both sighted artists and artists with partial or little sight. The audience was actively encouraged to touch all of the exhibits. Natasha Lewer produces ceramic sculptures that are based on organic forms such as those found in the sea. A lot of her work is covered with a flocking material which makes it extremely tactile and enticing to touch. I contacted the artist to ask how she 'flocked' her pieces as I really like the effects that can be achieved with this method of working. Apparently it is a very complicated process involving specialist machinery so she has her work professionally flocked!

Natasha Lewer 'Barnacles' (ceramic and flocking)

Natasha Lewer 'Primaries' (glazed and flocked ceramic)

Natasha Lewer 'Red and blue blood cells' (ceramic and flocking)

I like the tactile quality of this work and the interesting organic forms that the artist produces. It is also nice to see work that is highly coloured since so much ceramic work at the moment is matt, white porcelain.

Another ceramic artist using texture in her work is Annette Bugansky. She produces forms that look like they have been knitted by way of impressing and slipcasting:

Annette Bugansky (detail)

Annette Bugansky

I really like the tactile quality of this work and it relates well to the work I have been doing with fabric and porcelain slip. I think it's a very interesting way of combining textiles and ceramics to produce work that can be explored through touch.

Ikuko Iwamoto is another interesting ceramic artist and she has produced ceramic work for the visually impaired. She has developed the tactile quality of her work using dots and spikes on the surface and she invites her audience to touch it:

Ikuko Iwamoto 'Spiky spiky bowl'

Ikuko Iwamoto 'Nucleolus pofupofu teapot'

I also really like the work of Tamsin van Essen. I first came across her work at the 'Skin' exhibition at the Wellcome Instute in London. She had produced two apothecary pots that were decorated to look like the skin disease psoriasis. Her work explores the stigma of diseases and the contemporary quest for perfection and beauty. She manipulates her ceramic works to accentuate blemishes and faults such as acne, syphillis and osteoporosis:

Tamsin van Essen 'Psoriasis' Apothecary jar 2008-2010

'Psoriasis' (detail)

I think the glazing effects that she achieves in her work are very impressive. She must have had to carry out an enormous amount of experiments with undergalzes, glazes, slips etc. to achieve the desired results of emulating certain human diseases. I am very interested in her work as it has strong links with medicine which fascinates me. I particularly like the 'psoriasis' pot above as the cream crackled glaze on the top of the piece reminds me of lace and it has a tactile quality reminiscent of fine fabric.