Pottery

As a final project in ceramics club this term we made tee light 'holders'. Very simple slab construction, plainly glazed.

mugs (2)

And they're out of the kiln - not cracked! But yet to test if they leak!!

mugs

In ceramics club we have been making mugs/beakers. We used rolled slabs formed around tubes. After bisque firing, yesterday we glazed them and today they are being fired for a final time. Fingers crossed that they don't split (or leak when used!).

tigers & dishes

Yesterday the y1's created some pieces based on Rousseau's painting 'Tiger in a Storm'. They've also been reading 'The Tiger Who Came To Tea' by Judith kerr. We used techniques from the last couple of weeks in that we wove, using paper strips, the tiger's stripes and then stitched the grass, using coloured wool.

Meanwhile in ceramic club we took home our completed and fired dishes.

ceramics

Our y2's are in the throes of making rice bowls (to tie with their studies about China). They've been bisque fired and are awaiting glazing tomorrow.

Meanwhile, we've got some new ceramics pens in school so I thought I'd try them out on an old IKEA plate. Just got to put them in the kiln when it's on a 'drying' program to fix them.

new(ish) card

My better half is selling Polish pottery at a Xmas fair this weekend. I might sneak some of my hand-drawn cards onto the stall and see if they sell.

'polish' figures

A couple of faux, ceramic 'polish pottery' type figures. The one 'sitting' on the edge is a simple slab figure whilst the one with attached limbs has a hollow body and a large wooden bead for a head. The hair is hand-made string, that I've had for ages, and the fixings include vintage buttons.

Stop press : the ceramic poppies that we made in school have so far raised over €500 for the Royal British Legion.

yesterday

A bit of wax resist with Y3. Ancient Greek designs which we are going to cut into vases and urns.

 

Watery-paint blown trees and finger print leaves with Y1.

greek & roman

In Y4 we began to create our mosaics following on from last weeks designs. We are using small reconstituted tiles (as our tesserae) that can be cut (carefully) with scissors and glued into place with ordinary PVA glue. Once they are complete and dry we'll grout them.

 

In Y3 we have decorated our 'Ancient Greek' coil pots. We used sharpies so as to get a better and finer line. We might PVA threm to seal everything together, we might not!

potty

Coil pots with Y3 yesterday to tie in with their Greek project. We used a tube as a former and found it much easier than just trying to coil the  clay 'sausages' free-style as we have done in the past.

 

 

Here they are in the kiln prior to going through a drying and then a firing programme. Some of the children managed to add rims to their pots.

 

 

We won't glaze them as we are after a matt finish and our glazes are all gloss. (Note to self - order some matt glazes!) We'll probably use poster paints to add decoration or even just sharpie pens. The latter might be better to achieve a finer line.

recent stuff

A few recent pieces. First up a ceramic abstract figure designed to sit on a shelf. My wife sells Polish pottery so I painted it to tie in with a blue/white colour scheme. The hair is handmade twine tied with a ribbon. The spots are painted on after firing as they have previously 'run' when I've tried to do them with glazes.

 

 
Next, a painting (acrylic on paper, roughly A4 size) with a similar theme. This will hopefully, once framed, end up on the 'shop' wall - maybe even with a very modest price tab!

Finally, another footy piece - 'Off to the Match'. Again acrylics on heavyweight paper.

painted pots

Today in Y3 we painted the 'Greek' pots we made over the last two weeks. A mix of black paint and s'graffito with a bent paperclip resulted in this image of Medusa.

 

 

A lot of the pots had cracked but this only added to their 'ancient-ness' - we chose to explain it away by saying that of course they'd be like that after over 2000 years!

at school

In FS2 today we read a story called 'Penguin Small' (by Mick Inkpen ) and so, made some small penguins! Simple card and paper construction with a sticky label forming the white front.

 

 

In Y2 we painted our Chinese bowls (made from air-drying clay). We used blue over an undercoat of white. When they've dried, we'll add a coat of PVA to seal them and give them a bit of a shine. Can't wait till the new kiln comes and we can start experimenting with 'proper' clay and real glazes.

a clay day today

Y2 are studying China so today we made 'rice' bowls using the thumbpot method. They did well at keeping a uniform thickness to the walls. We couldn't make them too thin as the air-drying clay cracks easily. We have though ordered a kiln and so in a few months time (when the new art room is up and running) we should be able to produce fired and glazed items - yay!

 

 

We even managed to put 'feet' onto them (using a coil of clay) - hopefully we smoothed them in enough to stop them falling apart when dry!

'scraper pottery'

As a change from using clay, this week we made 'Ancient Greek pottery' using black card, orange oil pastels and matchsticks! My first idea was to create handled pots but I quickly realised that this would be very difficult to do with the whole class at the same time - I would've been running round stapling and fixing like a madman!!

So we settled on plates - easier to fabricate, and even easier to display on a wall. We cut black card circles and coloured them using orange pastels (to simulate terracotta).

We then scratched/scraped patterns and designs into the layer of pastel using a matchstick.

These are a couple of the finished plates. This week we've been looking at the myth of Odysseus and the Cyclops - hence the bottom plate.

We painted our 'Greek' pots yesterday. We scratched back to the terracotta clay using a pin for extra detail. They're sitting on our 'market stall' waiting to tempt passers by.

page pals & pots

Managed to get Enterprise club up and running again. We began to batch paint our bookmarks.You might just be able to spot some frogs, horses, rabbits and the odd mouse. We'll be detailing them further next week.



We've also been going potty again. Thumb pots with handles and rims this week. I think we'll be decorating them next week - we just haven't got the space to make and dry much more!

thumb pots

We're doing the Ancient Greeks this term so in art we had a go at making some clay pots. We've started off with thumb pots (or pinch pots if you prefer) and will be going onto coil pots. Unfortunately we haven't got a kiln so are having to use air-drying clay - am sure the pots will still be reasonably serviceable though. We'll varnish them to add a bit of protection 'cos they can sometimes be quite fragile.

The children thoroughly enjoyed getting their hands dirty (literally!). I've reminded them that aprons are a very good idea!