Abby's Art

For this project I used a metal ring, waxed chord, leather chord, beads, feathers, and glue. I am very pleased with the way it turned out, but I would like to make another one in a more intricate way. This dream catcher is inspired by the Objwe Native American tribe, and is believed to catch all bad dreams. When someone had a bad dream it would catch it in the web and in the morning the spider woman would burn it with the suns rays. If they had a good dream the dream would travel down into the feathers and you can see them sway.

I wanted to experiment with this breadth piece. I wanted to incorporate mixed media to one of my clay pieces and saw this done by other culture and I wanted to try it. I am proud of how it turned out but I wish I made the holes a little bit bigger.

This is my first new breadth piece. I wanted to make something very simple and give another use for it. I am very pleased with this piece and I would like to make more like it.

While I am happy with learning the technique to making this type of earring I am not pleased with the one I have created. In my first attempt my needle broke when I was almost done with it, and I was unable to finish it due to the needle being jammed into the beads. When I made this one I made it smaller than I would have liked to because I wanted to see if I could at least finish one. I did finish the structure of this one, but in the process of ending it by weaving the string and tying it off I broke the needle. On my next earring I will want to buy more symmetrical beads so my needle will fit easier throughout the earring.

I created this tree sculpture using terra cotta fragments. All of these fragments were once bowls or other objects created by the Native American tribes in Georgia. To make this tree I first make a structure out of chicken wire, and covered it with plaster. After that I wrapped the whole tree in twine. Once it was completely covered I used the twine to place the terra cotta fragments onto the tree. I am  pleased with how it turned out, but I would like to eventually put it on a base so I do not have to worry about it falling over.

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     My current idea for my concentration is focused around Native Americas and their artworks. Today many Native American art and even Native American culture is being taken advantage of and is being used for things like sports teams logos, which makes people lose sight of what things really mean. As and artist I know how much time goes into making pieces of art and know what they made was special to them. Most of the Native Americans contains designs with meanings to them. When I make my concentration pieces I want to mimic their styles and techniques but I will add design elements that are personal to me.

For my wind-chime I wanted to make it simple and complex at the same time. To accomplish this I make small squares and balls. To make each square unique I stamped them all with different patterns. In order to make my balls I had to put them on rods while I painted them so when I put them in the kiln they would not stick to the bottom. When I did this I had to sacrifice a few balls because they either did not fit, or they got stuck to the rod so I had to break them to get them off. Overall I am happy with how this turned out, and I would like to make another one of these one day.

When you watch people wheel throw it looks pretty easy, and you might think you can make something cool on your first or second try. That is what I thought, and I found out I was very wrong. When wheel throwing, the first thing you have to do is center your clay. The first few times I attempted this I did not know what I was trying to do or how to do it. This simple task took me a while to figure out, but by the my third day of throwing I became pretty good at it. After centering you have to make your blob into a bowl (or something else) by making a hole in the top. This part always started out good for me, but as I stated to try and play with it to get the right shape it would get tricky. In my maroon pot, The swivel design happened by mistake when I messed up on trying to make the pot wider. Also, my elephant earring try was a large pot but when I was trying to fix the shape I broke the whole top half off. My blue pot is a little lopsided, but after the first

For this project I chose to make a pot to plant succulents in. Once I constructed my box I made a sticker that read "abby", and I put it on the side of the pot and painted over it. To glaze my pot I used sponges, which let me blend the colors where they meet. I am very satisfied with the outcome of my pot!

For this project I tried to incorporate all the techniques I learned, and separate them in geometric shapes. As you can see my pot exploded. I tried to preform very intense surgery on it, but it did not make it out of the kiln.  I plan on breaking this up and turning this into a mosaic. After smashing my already broken pot into pieces I glazed over all of them with clear glaze and touched up the pieces that lost their color. After this I used plaster to stick all of the pieces to the table. To make the edges of the table look neat, I added a design around the edge. Overall, I am very happy how the table turned out (but I still wish the pot did not break).

Mishima When using the mishima technique you start of by getting your slab. After you have a surfaceyou get your tools and carve a design. Then dab the glaze into your lines. Then get a sponge and wipe off the rest of the glaze. Now you are ready to fire! (This is the technique I will be using) (picture from https://www.amaco.com/clay_how_tos/178 )  My Example Sgraffito Start off by putting your glaze over your whole peice. Have your design ready on another paper and transfer it onto your surface. Get your tool  and outline what you traced. Now scrape away all of the areas around your outline to make your design pop. Now you are ready to fire!! (picture from https://www.amaco.com/clay_how_tos/178 ) My Example Sprigging Sprigging is when you make a design with thin clay and then you attach it to your sculpture/ base. Another  way  is  to  use plaster and create a mold for your clay.  After you mold it you attach it to your piece.