This is a 6 inch wide plate made out of red clay and glazed with light blue glaze. You may be noticing the blatant lack of any design or... love put into this plate and there is a very simple explanation. I hate plates. I hate making them and I especially hate footing them and by the time I'm done I just want to put them on the cart and never look at them again. So yes this plate is just blue. Its simplicity expresses my frustration in plates. I glazed it as sort of a test because I was curious to see how the red clay and blue glaze would look together and since plates are dumb I didn't care if it didn't turn out very well but it's not completely awful. The splattering where you can see the red clay is like my frustration bubbling under the surface. The art element it displays is simplicity and clarity. There is nothing confusing that needs pondering when it comes to this plate. It hides nothing. It isn't a grand metaphor. It has no facade. It's just a blue plate.
This is my set of 3! I Had a lot of fun with the red clay and I decided to carve into all of them similarly to make them match. One is a 4 inch tall and 5 inch wide bowl with a flared out edge, one is a 6 inch wide plate, and the last is a 4 inch tall cup. I love the way the red clay turned out with its earthy color it almost seems genuine or pure. Like the clay came straight from the dirt into these forms. I didn't want to disturb the already beautiful color of the clay with excessive glazing so I just used black as a accent to make the swirl designs. This minimalism isn't always my style because I do like the complicated designs but with the red clay it isn't necessary. The mood of these pieces is calm but ordered because of the simple shapes. |
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May 2014
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