Photography

One of the great things about the internet is how easy it is to see other people's work.  One of the drawbacks is how easy it is to see other people's work that is much better than one's own!  Or maybe that's a good thing too.

I've always enjoyed photography and within the family have been the best photographer.  Along the way I acquired a few friends who were very good indeed, but that was ok because they were still in the minority as the majority of people either didn't have cameras or didn't take many photos apart from at weddings and along with my other artwork.  Knowing people who took better photos gave me something to aim at.  I continued to develop my photography with a view to one day perhaps being able to exhibit some photos. 

With the arrival of digital photography and related technology came an explosion in the popularity of photography and with social media everyone's efforts can be readily available for admiration. I now have several friends whose photos are of such a high standard that I don't expect mine will ever reach those heights!  I've also seen thousands of photos taken by people I don't know, which just take your breath away with their precision and composition.  The place of photography in my artwork has been diminishing for the past five years or so and I think this is part of the explanation.

On the other hand, put me in a location with plenty of wildlife and a little more time than usual, and I get the bug again.  I love digital cameras.  It's normal for me to take 50 or more shots to get just one that I like.  I think I took 62 shots of the little lizard at the top.  (He's only about 15cms long, including tail) though a very modest 30 or so of the deer.

There were certainly more than 50 pics taken of goldfinches.  I took one batch the first day I found several feeding away at the thistles and the second day, having got at least some halfway decent shots, was braver with the noise I made and opened a window perhaps 5 metres away from them.  They didn't interrupt their feeding so I was able to snap away and out of the second batch got this one, which I'm really pleased with.

And finally, butterflies.  I'm still busy taking them.  If you've followed my blog over the years you'll have seen pics of butterflies before.  These are  three of my favourites from the past two weeks.  I love the sweet pea pic because there's a little bug in there as well as the butterfly.  I never tire of the black and white butterflies, and the last shot is one I'm really pleased with because of the overall composition of the picture.

Something old, something new

At a really stretchy stretch, you could say there is something borrowed about this and if you're feeling really elastic about it then the pink is a bluish pink.  And relax.  It really is just something old and something new.

I did a couple of these pieces about 4 years ago, this one and a landscape, using layers of organza and machine and hand embroidery.  They were fairly small and I had the idea of perhaps going back to an old style of work and putting them inside a mount and frame.  I had a bit of a play with the landscape one and realised the format just wasn't doing what I wanted and then there they both sat.  That's the old part.

Recently asked if I could provide something four inches square to promote the fourth birthday of By Local, I thought of this little chicken and found that with a bit of trimming it would be just the job.  Mounted over hardboard, backed and ready to hang, this is a format that really works. 

I'm hoping to go on to work on a lot of little mini-pics, in a variety of techniques, some maybe silk-painted images, some machine embroidered and perhaps some appliqued like this one.  There's a big gap between ideas and reality, of course, and I don't know when they'll actually happen, but I'm hoping that mini-pics can be made at a really affordable price - difficult to achieve in hand-made work, particularly textiles.

Mini-pics: tiny textiles treats.

Dolly and Holly and Molly

This is Dolly.  My mum made Dolly when I was probably a little less than two years old. Apparently mum propped her up on the sofa and when I came in I went straight up to her and said "Jane's dolly!" so it's just as well she was. Her dress and hat (a little moth-eaten now, I see) were made from remnants of Mum's coat material. Mum always made her own and my clothes and I'm sure I get my connection to textiles from her.  She says now she doesn't think Dolly was ever washed, so she's done pretty well.  The greyish patch on the forehead is as much worn as grubby.  

 

I wouldn't go anywhere without Dolly for many years.  I suppose she was in effect my teddy or comfort blanket.  Later I had first a baby doll and then a girl doll, both of whom I liked to dress in different outfits but Dolly is stitched into her clothes like rag dolls often are.

I wanted to make a rag doll for Holly, our granddaughter, but when I looked for patterns I came across one for a proper doll that really appealed to me, not least because the website told me that clothes for an 18" "American Girl" doll would fit her.  It seemed a little early for a proper doll for Holly but I thought I could make the doll while off work and then she would be ready for when she was needed.  In the mean time, though, Holly took a fancy to another child's doll's pram and now has one of her own and her mum decided she might well be ready for the doll earlier than we'd thought.

So I made Molly.  It was a really therapeutic project, something I really wanted to do and had plenty of time to spare for because I couldn't work.  I love miniaturised things anyway so had great fun making the clothes and eventually the shoes.  To my great surprise, Molly stands up on her own in her shoes.  And here she is:

And here are Holly and Molly meeting for the first time. 

I am so pleased to learn that Holly and Molly are already getting on really well.  Holly can do her own shoes up now so she also takes Molly's shoes off and puts them back on.  She wheels her round and round the garden in her pram and goes and holds her hand when she is standing up. 

I had such fun being inventive about the clothes - did you know that one pair of adult socks makes one pair of tights or one t-shirt for an 18" doll?  Or that a child's vest is exactly right to make proper pants for a doll?  No, I thought not.  Here is Molly in her authentic-fabric pants and the rest of her outfit laid out in front of her.  You can imagine that I am already planning her next outfit.

And now for something completely different ....

Just in case you feel disappointed that the title of this blog does mean just that - that I'm writing about something completely different from my usual subject matter - here is a gratuitous link: And now for something completely different

However, the real point is that this piece of writing came out of doing a survey for a friend's research.   As I've mentioned, I do like to write but have to have something to write about, so I really enjoyed the exercise because the topic came from someone else.  I hope some of you may enjoy reading this too and if you would like to take part in the research yourself, I'm sure Sean would be grateful.

"Dingly-dong, dingly-dong, dingly-dong, dingly-dong, dingly-dong, dingly-dong, Ding! Ding!"  I only need to hear or even imagine hearing these glockenspiel chimes again and I follow automatically with "Are you sitting comfortably?  Then we'll begin." and I'm back in a certain room with certain memories.  Being a child of a family who moved about every couple of years, I must have heard the introduction in at least two other places but this is the one which is instantly conjured up by the sound memory.

It is about 1959 and I'm five.  We live in an army 'married quarter' in Germany.   Lunch is of course finished, always being at one o-clock.  We had it in the kitchen as usual.  Dad has gone back to work and it's just Mum and me, or maybe a friend has come round to play.   It's nearly quarter to two.   I've been playing with my electric train set on the dining room table.  When you switch the dial on to start the train you have to do it slowly and carefully, not suddenly, and there's always a buzz at the beginning before it moves to the quieter sound made as the train gets going. If you don't do it right with the buzz at the beginning and it's too fast, the train can derail straight away and you have to balance it back again onto the tracks.  I'm not always good at that and have to wait till an adult has time to come and fix it so it's important to get it right so play isn't interrupted.  The buzz before it starts is a good sign.  But once Mum comes in to the room I know it's time to stop.  I want to go on playing but at the same time it's important to be sitting down before the dingly-dongs begin.  It's a ritual, a sort of good luck thing, though I don't actually think of it in those terms.  But I have to be sitting cross-legged on the carpet before the dingly-dongs. I sit staring at the huge Grundig radiogram in the corner of the room.  You have to sit there looking at it to listen.  You always have to look at the thing you're listening to.

I hope Mum has remembered in time because sometimes she's a bit late. I always try not to be.  I won't know until it's warmed up.  When she switches it on its window lights up with a warm yellow glow and you have to wait for the sound to gradually build up.

Then the programme begins.  It's always in the same format, songs, stories and poems for small children.  Mum does't always stay in the room but the programme is called (as those of you of a 'certain age' will by now have realised) "Listen With Mother.  And for those of you who are of that certain age, here's a little reminder:  What memories does this bring back for you? 

 

By popular request

I don't normally do by popular request.  There are all sorts of things I could make that people would buy but generally I try to stick to making what I want to make.  Here's an example of how you can do both!

Some people had commented that my earrings were too long and dangly for them, and didn't I make any smaller ones.  Well, these aren't really what you'd call small, but they are smaller than the others, at just 3cms from the end of the ear wire to the tip of the earring.  Once I had the idea for the shape, I could see that it lent itself to being slightly smaller than some of the others.  All my earlier designs are 4.5, 5 or 5.5cms long, so this does go some way to please those with shorter necks (as I understand that's the reason people want shorter earrings.)

The next idea I had worked out shorter than I expected, too.  These are certainly not as delicate as the kite-shaped earrings, but they're still only 3.5cms long.

Finally, some that are similar to the above (also about 3.5cms), which are really delicate and pretty and then some that are completely different (3.2cms.).

I like all of the new designs but the orange ones here at the bottom are possibly my favourites.  I'd keep them, except I can't wear orange.

What price experience?

On Saturday I put the wrong set of pyrometric cones in the kiln when I packed it.  The ones that went in were for my high-temperature firing.  The kiln was loaded with pots glazed in oatmeal, which is fired to a lower temperature.

I only realised my mistake when I was wondering why the kiln was taking so long to come to temperature and I suddenly remembered what I'd done.  Cones are how I know what heat-work has been done to the pots, so they are of vital importance.  I rely on them.  The pyrometer shows climb and fall and what it shows is roughly related to the temperature inside the chamber but recently the figures had been changing dramatically and after a repair to the pyrometer I didn't know whether it would behave as it had recently or before it started to go wrong.

So I had to make a judgement about when to stop the firing, based entirely on my own experience of the kiln, together with some guesswork about the pyrometer.  Too hot and the colour would be wrong.  Underfired and the pots would be unusable.  One can refire but that has its own risks.  There are a lot of pots in a kilnful.

Front shelves

This is what greeted me when I opened the kiln this morning.  These pots look exactly as they should.  The kiln has been fired to the optimum temperature.  Right on the button!

I am, of course, mightily relieved.  But I'm also really proud of myself.  This is the best result I could have hoped for and it comes as a result of my own judgement.  I have a lot more useful experience as a potter than I sometimes think I do.  What price experience?  Several hundred pounds worth of pots in this case. 

As self-employed, sole trading artists I think we often forget the value of experience.  "I could do that" is often heard from visitors to craft markets and the like when looking at handmade products and then looking at the price.  And it's possibly quite true.  However, my experience means I can more or less reliably produce the items I'm asked for, time after time.  It also means I work much more quickly than someone who is not working full time at it and what price experience in this case means that I'm able to charge a lower rate than otherwise for my products because I'm reasonably fast at making them.  And it means that if things go wrong I stand a good chance of being able to fix them!

I run occasional workshops in silk-painting, free machine embroidery and other textiles skills and recently have been doing some tuition sessions on a one-to-one basis and as it happens, I've been thinking about place of experience in this work too.  The fact that even people who have a flair for the work (which my students do) sometimes need tuition is not because I'm better at it (I'm not sure I am) but because of what I have learned in my many years of experience, both of the materials and skills themselves and about how people learn to use them. Experience is what I am being paid for as a teacher.

What price experience?  Possibly more than I'm asking!

Back shelves

J is for Juggler

Look carefully and you'll see a letter J bottom left of the mug, blue on green.  Then even more carefully and you'll see a silhouette of a juggling figure and three juggling clubs.

Well, I did say you had to look carefully.  I made this mug many, many years ago, at a guess probably about thirty years ago.  At the time I was attending pottery summer schools each year at Ridge Pottery.  I spent my weeks there each summer trying out different decorating styles as my skills increased.  This one uses slip.  The juggler and clubs are made by wetting newspaper cutouts of the shapes, attaching them to the pot before dipping in blue slip  The newspaper peels off when the slip dries out.  The letter is painted on through a newspaper stencil.

I might have got into more slip decoration eventually but the particular clay, glazes and firing method I use don't respond well to dipping in slip, so this was one idea which fell by the wayside.  I have a feeling that that particular year I made three or four others of these for friends as presents.  But it's a long, long time ago. 

In the mean time, though, J is for juggler in the sort of working life I've built up.  I like all the different components and mostly do manage the juggling well.  Today, though, is one of those rare days when the clubs all fall to the ground.

What with making the Hen Portraits, putting on Another Beastly Art Exhibition and a week of tidying loose ended jobs along with fitting in a number of teaching sessions, I haven't been in the pottery for several weeks.  The situation is becoming more pressing as pots are needed that will take a few weeks to produce.  So the week ahead was well planned.  Two teaching slots on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday in the pottery all day, Thursday cooking and arranging the house for a bring and share, Friday teaching first thing and handles on mugs made on Tuesday and on Saturday I'm going to be attending my first ever school reunion.

The clubs all fell to the ground when I found that the clay I thought was kept just right in an old fridge had gone hard.  New clay much too soft and will take a day sat out in a heated pottery. 

Not enough raw materials for a spontaneous glaze mixing sessions.

Sewing machine booked in for servicing today so couldn't finish a couple of projects which would have been usefully tidied out of the way.

So, failed juggling.  I'm finding useful things to do, of course.  Putting together an order of glaze materials, for one!  Another couple of orders for silk-painting supplies.  Packaging up an order to go in the post.  It's not the same, though.  I really, really wanted to be making mugs today.