1. One of the major tools i have used in class has been the slab roller, which is used to flatten out clay to a desired width by sending it through two rollers. While it is a more simple tool it has an important purpose when doing slab pieces of clay, and it helped greatly with many of my projects to get a neater piece over if i had flatten my clay out manually. One other tool I used was the sponge, the sponge had many purposes with clay, and I used it for many things to fix up my projects. It was especially useful when my pieces would have uneven parts in them when the clay was still wet, since it was very good for smoothing blemishes out. The exacto knife was another tool I used a lot alongside with the needle, these tools are as they sound a small precise knife and a needle. I used to add small details into my pieces, for example I did my sgraffito piece by using a needle to scratch off the underglaze and create little details with it. ( Pottery wheel is a tool example).
2. I learned a lot about many different tools and how to correctly use them by the end of the semester. One thing I feel I learned a lot on was how to use clay correctly as a medium, and that tools can be practically anything, for example a sponge has many different usages. It can be used on the wheel to help shape a piece or on a slab to fix mistakes. I also learned a lot about tools I did not use to often, such as the pottery wheel. From watching others use it and seeing how they would use certain tools or techniques I was able to make an object using it, and while it may not have been the best piece it gave me experience. I would have never been able to have even used a pottery wheel without the information given to us, for example how to center the piece by positioning your hands in a certain way. I understand a lot more about the purpose of tools and how to correctly use them now after having a lot of hands on experience using them. I feel as if i actually have a little bit of knowledge on how to work with clay, much better than how I started off.
2. I learned a lot about many different tools and how to correctly use them by the end of the semester. One thing I feel I learned a lot on was how to use clay correctly as a medium, and that tools can be practically anything, for example a sponge has many different usages. It can be used on the wheel to help shape a piece or on a slab to fix mistakes. I also learned a lot about tools I did not use to often, such as the pottery wheel. From watching others use it and seeing how they would use certain tools or techniques I was able to make an object using it, and while it may not have been the best piece it gave me experience. I would have never been able to have even used a pottery wheel without the information given to us, for example how to center the piece by positioning your hands in a certain way. I understand a lot more about the purpose of tools and how to correctly use them now after having a lot of hands on experience using them. I feel as if i actually have a little bit of knowledge on how to work with clay, much better than how I started off.
What was your favorite material that you used this year? My favorite material I used this year had to be clay, which is funny because I started off slightly disliking it. I like clay as a medium due to the fact that it has many stages that it can be worked on in different ways, due to its slow drying. Clay is great for its ability to be constantly fixed and reshaped, for example when I made my pit fire piece the pyramid was very uneven and lumpy, and just by using my hands and water I completely reshaped it. The fact that you have the ability to fix mistakes very easily is a big reason why I really like working with clay. I also just like the process of clay, I think it's just cool that you can essentially take refined dirt and make it into almost anything from sculptures to bowls by just heating it up and removing all moisture. Working with clay is also oddly for me at least feels timeless, it reminds me of history and how it was once a major invention/art that helped progress modern society. On a final note for how much I like clay, I hate how dry It makes my hands. ( Image is an example of a clay piece I made on the pottery wheel).
My most successful project was my tray project, which I made four stacking bowls for. The theme of this project was to make usable items to hold food in them, and had to have at least two different parts/Items. To make my pieces I would start out by spraying the molds with cooking spray to prep them for the clay. I would then wedge the clay I was using until I had gotten a fairly flat piece of clay, and would then flatten it out on the slab roller. In order to fit it into the mold I would slowly press the clay into the mold until it was resting perfectly inside of the mold, and then would trim off the edges of the excess clay. For the design of the bowls Abby would cut small insertions in the rims of the bowls and make a pattern on the bottom of them with an exacto knife, the finishing touch to the bowls was an application of clear glaze. I think these are my most successful pieces because they are neater than my other pieces and I just like the design and shape of the bowls, also that they fit inside of each other. ( Below is an image of my pieces).
The project that I felt provided the least in terms of teaching the concepts of the class was the masking tape shoe project. I understood the reasoning for it, that it was to teach how to use an unconventional medium to create artwork, and I did like the project. I just feel that I would have rather used that time towards something with more creative freedom and taught me something more useful. The shoes just taught me how to use tape as a medium which I think is kind of pointless when other mediums are just better in terms of look and usability, for example clay. It did not really teach much either knowing how to layer something is not really that hard and making the project was really simple. I don't feel as if I really learned anything from it due to the fact that you only had one choice, which was a shoe, so the ability to even use the tape more creatively was further limited. Compared to the unconventional material project, which in my opinion taught a lot more on how to creatively use a material, make the tape one moot. This is not to say I did not personally enjoy the project, I actually liked it, just that It did not teach much. (Image below is of the finished shoe).