My creative space

Today I'm making a start on an order for Tokketok. She's up to some great things I think and I can't wait to see what she'll do with it all. She also send me a beautiful metal stamp to make my life a easier. Joke is a Belgian girl living in Portland, US and she's such a sweetie. I hope I get to meet her next time she's in Belgium as it doesn't look like I'll be going to Portland anytime soon! :)
She also made me make these and I think they are absolutely fabulous.

Want to show your creative space? Hop on over to Kootoyoo to play! It's fun! :)

My creative space

Today I'll be shipping off the work that was done at my workshop a few weeks back. It's about time after 2 weeks. I love how it all came out & can't wait to see what the ladies will do with it all after they receive it.

Do you remember I did some experiments with dipping thread into porcelain and twisting it around paper beads? Here are the results from that:The beads didn't come out really well, the thread is broken on the spot where I placed it on the kiln shelf. But they are quite sturdy I must say which is a complete surprise to me. I'll place 'em on some silversand next time so that they don't touch the shelves and hope that will make 'em whole.I also did a few beads with solid clay around the paperbead and then added a texture to them. They came out really sturdy and are light as a feather.
In the left hand corner you see the left over of a bead where I twisted thread around and then dipped it into porcelain slib.
Want to show your creative space? Hop over to Kootoyoo to play! It's fun! :)

New collaboration

A while back Veerle from Nevousinstallezpas asked me to make some beads for her and a little bit later she asked if I could make her some other stuff too. I was a bit tickled by the requests and we decided to do a collaboration instead.
What's the difference?
When someone asks me to make something, I try to make as asked. Then I sell and ship and that's the end of the story. It feels like a job.
A collaborartion leaves more space for thought. I can try out stuff and play to my hearts content. I can not only do what I've been asked to make but add a bit of me to it. I can experiment and it doesn't have to be perfect. I can send samples and she can just play to see if it works and then I can make the real thing. Yay!
Collaborating is exciting & especially in this case as we'll bring crochet and clay together - something that I have been wanting to do for ages...
It was one of the reasons I learned how to crochet but since I only know the basics, I think it's awesome to work with a master...
It feels like an adventure: exciting and inspiring. Can you wait?
A little update on the experiment I planned to do past weekend with the crochet beads I showed you in my creative space: when I found out that the base of the beads was solid wood, I didn't dare firing it in my ceramic kiln. I've done experiments with plant matter and paper, but never tried solid wood. I don't want to ruin the spirals of my kiln, alas I have nothing to show for I'm afraid.

made by Veerle from Nevousinstallezpas

But don't dispair, Veerle and I will hopefully show lots of exciting work in progress... and it will be one of a kind too. Double yay! :)

Happy package

First of all: thanks so much to all the people who send me a pimped feeling postcard. I love 'em all & I'm so happy that lots of people voted for their favorite.
And jip, we have a winner...

And this is the winning card:Congrats Veerle from Nevousinstallezpas!
An ArtMind happy package will be send to your address soon! :)

Second, I also received a happy package last week. Nicole from Babongohome send me this beautifully wrapped gift.
She somehow knew I was in need of a pincushion as I'm a beginning sewer, so she designed one especially for me.
She added a lovely, handmade porcelain button made at my Etsy craftparty. YAY!
So happy to see all the finished products with the things made at the craftparty. :)
It beautiful isn't it? Thank you, Nicole!

Sneak peek

A little sneak peek on work that will be in Anna's shop today.
Check it out here! :)

Helicopter leaves

You know those leaves that twirl around like a helicopter? I used to love them as a kid - well, actually, I still do! :)
I don't even know if they are called helicopter leaves really.
When I was making moulds the other day, I pressed some of those leaves in the mould. That way, the back side of the mould is not going to waste. I found these leaves in a park in Portugal when I was visiting Kerrin from Sigmosaics last year so I thought it was cool to see them in pressed in porcelain.
I made a little hole on top of the leaf and hope that Anna from LilaRubyKing will find a way to turn these into a neat jewellery design sometime...

New work

Tommorrow you can find new collaborative work in Anna's shop LilaRubyKing. As usual, I like to tease you a little... don't forget to check it out on monday! :)

And I have listed the bunnies that I have been working on recently in my shop.
You can find 'em in the Bunny Art - section. Aren't they cute?

Collaboration news

Have you ever seen these beautiful earrings in Anna's shop?
I love the shape of the vines and the silk red thread that connects them.
Anna launched the idea to make porcelain vines and then combine them with the silver ones.
I loved the idea so I got to work last August. It looks good in the picture but in real, these vines are very thin and fragile. Porcelain clay is super stubborn and dries really quick so adding a hole can mean that when the clay is too dry, it causes breakage.
Porcelain clay is really strong when fired so then it's nearly impossible to drill the hole afterwards. But after many tries and failures, I was sad to see this idea go...
So, I pondered on the idea and then thought that making them in 3D could be a way to make it work. They would not be able to be combined with Anna's vines but I'm sure that Anna would find a way to make it look pretty whichever way they are used. I made 3D vines in several sizes:
And perhaps it will look a bit like this? Only Anna knows that right now.
Keep your eyes peeled on her shop for the day when she uploads them...

Work in progress

Every now and then I love to share some work in progress.
These birds came out of the kiln earlier this week. They are not ready to assemble yet as they need to be sanded first. A job that I really dread as you all know...
After they are sanded, they have to get some legs. I cut the legs in different sizes so you get small and large birdies.First I glue the legs in the bottom of the birdie.
I let 'em dry before I glue them to the bottom part.
Then I take my time to find a nice bottom for each bird and there we have a large flock.
I'll photograph them tommorrow and will list them in my shop as individuals, pairs or little flocks. A larger flock is excited to fly off to a shop in Melbourne! I would be excited too, I love Melbourne! Lucky birds! :)

Launch of new jewelry line

Anna from lilarubyking on Etsy just launched our first items of the new jewelry line.
Make sure to check 'em out. :)
One click on any of these pics will bring you right to the listing!

Studio happenings

Superhappy to be back to my studio after the X-mas days. Here's a peek in my studio on what's happening in there today:

Clean up yesterday's mess from mould making.Sand porcelain pieces for my collaboration with Anna from lilarubyking.Finish piggybanks so they can dry.

Photograph Decopatched singing birds.

Draw happy faces on the happy girls.

That's a lot to get done today, I'm not sure I'll manage but I'll try.
I dread the sanding and there's a lot of it... *sigh*
What are your plans today?

The singing birds are back...

After they sold out within the week, I decided to make a new batch of singing birds.
I'm working on some colorful ones too but they will be listed later on this week.
Of course you can find them in my shop! :)

The secret project... work in progress

Last monday I shipped a parcel to my secret partner. I made the first part of the production on the things we agreed on. I couldn't believe really how little it was in volume - so many teeny tiny bits but it will make for a good start I hope.
I put some things in there to surprise her although I could not wait to share pictures of it of course. I experimented with some red underglaze. Definately needs more tweeking but it looks cool I think. She replied saying that she'd be dreaming of red spots. Is that a good or a bad sign? :)And then she had asked me to make a kind of drop with a crackle glaze on the bottom.
I absolutely love this! I just couldn't wait any longer to share it with you. I think we should make more of these although I have no clue yet what she'll do with these! :)
I suppose it's my turn to be teased of what she'll do with it now... *sigh*
I think I loved teasing her and you better! :)As soon as I get so see some pictures of what she produces, I will show... I can't wait! :)

You can find more pictures of the finished products in my Flickr stream. I must admit I was quite impressed myself by the Barbie hands after they had been sanded and fired.

To know the idea behind the secret project, go read the first blogpost here or click on the label 'the secret project' to see all the posts about it.
Can't wait to receive your guesses but think about it carefully 'cause you can only guess once! :)
You can send your guess to mitsy@artmind.eu and can not change your guess so think about it carefully...

The secret project.... work in progress

Remember my struggle to mould Barbie's hand last week? Well, the last option with the partly silicone, partly plaster mould worked OK. Not entirely satisfied but I did mould quite a few and hope that after sanding I will have a few good ones left to use.And monday a lovely surprise arrived in the mail. My secret partner had sent me some left overs from colored glass. I could not wait to experiment with it. And so I did of course. It did not come out all well but two of them I find really lovely. I hope she will like 'em and will be able to use 'em.This week, I'll be firing a batch of the first production process on porcelain temperature. Will ship it next week and then my secret partner can make the final product with it. I'm very excited about this! :)

To know the idea behind the secret project, go read the first blogpost here or click on the label 'the secret project' to see all the posts about it.
Can't wait to receive your guesses but think about it carefully 'cause you can only guess once! :)
You can send your guess to mitsy@artmind.eu and can not change your guess so think about it carefully...

How to color clay gradually?

When working with clay, it's nice to bring some color into it. Since I especially love objects that are unglazed, I sometimes color clay to get some gradations into it.
It's very easy to do this but while I was doing it, I mad a few snapshots to show you the process.

Here is what you need:
Clingfoil, mask, gloves, pigment, paper, (porcelain) clay and a scaleFirst weigh a certain amount of pigment to mix underneath the clay.
I advise you to write it down somewhere so in case you don't have enough,
you can still make the same mixture.

Then add the pigment to the clay.

Mix it underneath it and when it gets too dry, add a bit of water.

I made a little schedule to mix the clay so I wouldn't make any mistakes.
The end weight for all colors is 70 grams so you just add more or less colored clay to white clay.
I made 280 grams of colored clay and then weighed all the mixed colored parts and put them in clingfoil.

Then weigh 60g of white clay.

Mix both parts really well by kneading it.

And now you can start your gradation project!

When I was done mixing it looked like the darkest color wasn't really black
so I mixed another tone with lots of block pigment.
(oops forgot to write down how much I added)And this is the result when fired.

You can do this with polymer clay too of course only then you don't need to add pigment but you can start mixing right away!
It's fun to get some gradations of color in your work! :)