Around and About with Bulldog Pottery: September 2012

Sunday, September 9, 2012

Getting ready for the Potters Market at Charlotte's Mint Museum Randolph

Bruce Gholson loading the pottery kiln

We are in the process of getting ready for the upcoming Delhom League's 8th annual Potters Market Invitational. This is the first Moka glazed pottery kiln of this year, as we have been focused on our decoratively glazed work for the first half of the year. Our cycle changes from one year to the next depending on what we are getting ready for. Samantha was in The Green Hill Art Center's "By Example", June-August exhibition, and was the main reason why we stayed with the decorative glazes up until July. Samantha focused her attention on developing a body of work for the show. We are thrilled to announce that the 24 glazed beetle paintings titled "Coleoptera" sold as well as a few other pieces.

We had plans of glaze testing for new surfaces to get in our Moka glaze kiln, but time snuck up on us and our deadline for the Potters Market is upon us. We keep telling ourselves that our glaze testing has to come while we throw our pots because, when our time gets squeezed like it is now while glazing and loading, something has to give. Bruce has bags of glazes all ready mixed to test, and I have a bunch of tenmoku formulas that I want to mix up. So we are resolved to be ready to get them into our next kiln firing. Time is always a big juggling act.

I was listening to a podcast called Lean into Art last night. It is about the Art of Comics. This particular podcast is presented by Jerzy Drozd and Rob Stenzinger. They are professional comic illustrators and they talk about life as full time creative self-employed artists. I discovered the Art and Story podcast a few years ago where they worked together along with Kevin Cross. They gave the final podcast last year, their Big Finale. I was pleased to find out it was only the beginning of going into other projects, one of which is Lean into Art. Last night I listened to Time Time. Which yes you guessed it was about Time. They talked about what it was like to manage their time, and the trials and tribulations that we all have as creatives. Tick toc, tick toc.

8th Annual Potters Market Invitational - September 15, 10:00-4:00

Mint Museum Randolph

2730 Randolph Rd.

Charlotte, North Carolina

It' a begining

Life in the foliage, a predator?

Thursday, September 6, 2012

Cousins in Clay Mountains 2012

Mark Shapiro, Sam Taylor, Michael Kline, Samantha Henneke, Bruce Gholson

A couple of weekends ago we were up in the Mountains for "Cousins in Clay" at Michael Kline's Pottery. Mark Shapiro and Sam Taylor joined us, travelling all the way from Massachusetts. It was a great time, and there were many lovely pots to peruse. We always have fun when we get together with Michael, Sam, and Mark, enjoying the time spent talking pottery, our lives as potters, and of course what ever mischief we can get into. We took many pictures and made an album of them on the Cousins in Clay facebook page. You can see the album here at facebook Cousins in Clay Mountains 2012.

We are looking forward to joining up with the same gang, Michael, Sam, and Mark, in October along with nine other potters for "Pottery on the Hill" at the Hill Center in Washington D.C.

While working with and looking at all of the pictures we took at Mountain Cousins, We realized that we have yet to share with you images from our past Seagrove Cousins in Clay with Ron Meyers and Judith Duff. We will get to that soon. We have just finished designing the "save the date" postcard for our Cousins in Clay coming up next year! Mark your calendars for June 1 and 2, 2013, join us and our special guests David MacDonald from Syracuse, and Jack Troy from Pennsylvania.

Presently in the studio we are working on glazing a Moka glaze kiln for the upcoming Potters Market Invitational in Charlotte, at the Mint Museum Randolph, September 15, 2012, 10:00 - 4:00. To read all about it visit the Mint Museum's website for the details.