Fishing

We drove to Oklahoma to visit Bruce's family last week. On the way there we stopped off and visited our mountain "cousin" Micheal Kline and his family. The mountain artists were welcoming guests that weekend for the annual TRAC tour. This event and the River District Tour in Asheville came at an opportune time since we were driving by on our way to Stillwater. We visited Kyle Carpenter at his new studio and Clayspace. We also ran into Brian McCarthy, the owner of Highwater Clays at his educational and studio facility called The Odyssey Center. We had a good time visiting and seeing what was going on with some of the NC mountain potters including Shawn Ireland, Micheal Hunt and Naomi Daglish, Terry Gess, and Cynthia Bringle.

Here is Bruce bringing in a catfish at the lake

Bruce and his father got in 5 nights of fly fishing for catfish. One of the evenings was at a pond that was stocked with catfish, and the other four at a nearby lake, also with lots of nice sized catfish. Channel catfish are aggressive sight feeders, and will take a fly quite soundly. Our most successful flies were a couple of variations of "black woolly buggers".

Below was the night at the pond.

Samantha was the on sight photo journalist

Fishing was best and most beautiful right around sunset.

Bruce and Bob had these two on at the same time. Lipping catfish is not advised because they bite. Leave lipping to Noodlers and Okies.

I found this blog sight called Lopping Lair. You really need to check out the size of the catfish these guys caught.

Maxwell, Gardening, and Oklahoma

Ed and Gloria will be here in Seagrove taking care of Maxwell, shop, and the garden. Bruce and I are off to Stillwater, Oklahoma to visit family. I had plans to post pictures of the Cousins and let you know what an incredible weekend we had here. I still would like to do that and hopefully when I get back I will do this. To tell you the truth I don't know where this week went but we have been totally tired and can't even think clearly enough to do a good job of packing. We are going to take a vacation this weekend and visit our Cousin Mike out at his place and do the the Toe River Tour. Then its off to Asheville for the Studio Stroll, and to check out the Arboretum. Yesss... Our first time for these events. So please visit Gloria and Ed while we are away. I know they will enjoy seeing you. Jeffrey and Stephanie did a great post about Couins in Clay. To read about it until we get back check out Dean and Martin's Pottery blog.

What a fantastic song. Something we should sing everyday that we are alive.

Cousins in Clay

We had such a great time this past weekend. I really don't know where to start. Peter Lenzo (above) came into town for the event, and even brought some of his new work for us to see, as well as picked up a piece that Sid Luck had fired for him that was way cool.
There was a constant stream of pottery loving visitors that came to peruse the selection of pots on display.

More pictures later. Check out Tom Starland's blog... Carolina Unleashed for some details of the event. I will post more soon!

Cousins in Clay June 5 --2010

We are just about set up today. Getting ready with my coffee to head on out to finish up. Hope to see you today for this very special time with Val Cushing and Micheal Kline.

Surrounded by containers of yogurt

Yogurt? Not actually. We do like yogurt, but no the containers have been recycled to hold our glazes.

We are planning to glaze a few more pieces today. Then we will be setting up our tents and looking forward to this weekend with our "Cousins in Clay".

There are two other kiln openings happening here in Seagrove this weekend. Donna Craven and Chris Luther are holding special events at their places. If you are interested in researching other Seagrove Potters to visit you can do so at Discover Seagrove and Visit Seagrove websites. Also 5 miles down the street from here, Star is holding their Star Heritage Days. STARglass will be giving hot glass demos all day long on Saturday.

You can pick up information about Star Heritage Days at our place.

Wow this weekend has become quite a happening time!

Bulldog Pottery E-Card

We sent this e-card out yesterday about our upcoming event called "Cousins in Clay"

Would you like to be on our e-mail list and receive these updates periodically through the year? If so you can send us your e-mail or sign up to the right of this post and sign in there.

Hello Pottery Lovers,

"The Cousins" are coming --To Seagrove, NC. At Bulldog Pottery-Gholson/Henneke & Art Pottery-Johnston/Gentithes

On Saturday (June 5), "Cousins in Clay" begins at 9:00 am - 4:00 pm and on Sunday (June 6) between 10:00 am-4:00 pm.

Seven potters -- Two Locations - June 5&6 - Saturday and Sunday - Seagrove- in central NC.

Val Cushing (Alfred, NY) and Michael Kline (Bakersville, NC) will be joining us -- Bruce Gholson and Samantha Henneke -- here at Bulldog Pottery.

Allison McGowan (Concord, NC) will be joining Fred Johnston and Carol Gentithes at their pottery.

We would like all of our Bulldog Pottery supporters to know that next weekend will be a very special time for us. Our teacher, Alfred University's Professor Emeritus Val Cushing, from Alfred, NY is coming to join us with his most recent pots fired specifically for the "Cousins in Clay" event.

Please take the rare opportunity to enjoy a visit with Val Cushing. Val has been a major influence on us, regarding our approach to glazes, glaze testing, and just a pure enthuisam for the alchemy of glazes.

We are very excited to be hosting our Mountain Cousin Michael Kline and our very special guests Val Cushing and his wife Elsie. The potters will all be present and looking forward to greeting and talking with you on Saturday or Sunday.

Bulldog Pottery will have a selection of our molybdenum crystalline glazed vases, along with cups, teapots, insect and fossil fish jars, and porcelain wall paintings.

Follow us on our blog and stay updated at "Around and About with Bulldog Pottery" to find out what is happening at the Bulldog Pottery studio.

http://www.bulldogpottery.blogspot.com

Cheers,

Bruce and Samantha

P.S. Are you Facebook fans? Join Bulldog Pottery's Facebook page -

http://www.facebook.com/BruceGholson.SamanthaHenneke.BulldogPottery

P.P.S. Are Twitter fans? You can follow Bulldog Pottery's tweets at -

http://www.twitter.com/bulldogpottery

Bulldog Pottery

Bruce Gholson and Samantha Henneke

3306 US Hwy 220 Alt North

Seagrove, NC 27341

Bruce's cell 336-302-3469

www.bulldogpottery.com

bulldogatbulldogpottery.com

This Week's Peeks

We are busily glazing our work for our pottery event "Cousins in Clay"

Glazing-Sieving-Gardening-Playing

Glazing-Sieving-Gardening-Playing

All important ingredients to a fantastic and productive Sunday at Bulldog Pottery

Sieving and making batches of glazes is always one task that comes before every glaze cycle. We currently are using around 45 glazes, but we have had over 100 on our shelves. Glazes go in and out of favor for one reason or another, and we are always dreaming up new colors, and hoping for that one glaze that we have never seen before. Do you remember that song by Huey Lewis-- "I want a New Drug"? This is our theme song during days like today. Bruce and I sing this in the studio, but we sing "I want a new glaze".

Maxwell's job is an important one, and that is to keep a keen eye on his ball which at this moment has rolled under my chair.

Definitely in her element these days, Gloria has become one with the sunflower.

Garden May 24. Tomatoes are in, eggplants covered with row cloth and we are eating chard. Bruce picked shitakes off of our logs this morning. There is a stir fry in our future.

Cousins in Clay June 5 & 6, 2010

We are in the throws of glazing now for Cousins in Clay. This is always such an exciting time for Bruce and I. We so enjoy pulling out our vases with our iridescent crystalline glaze. We will be working on some cups and wall glaze paintings plus some other pieces like teapots and mushroom jars with insects on them. Stay Tuned......

Pot Jam in D.C. at Hinckley Pottery

We started the evening off on top of Nancy Oneill's apartment building Saturday evening before going over to Hinckley Pottery. Nancy has been taking classes there and is now making the glazes for Hinckley. Hinckley Pottery is located downtown Washington D.C. and is a place where you can sign up for 10 week 2.5 hour classes during the year. There are 5 different instructors besides Jill Hinckley, and classes can be taken during the week with children's classes offered as well. Hinkley Pottery has been there for around 20 years, you can read about Jill Hinckley here (also if you click on the other instructors faces you can read about them too). Her partner Susan is the other 1/2 of Hinckley.

The crowd for the Pot Jam numbered around 45, and all were enthusiastic about pottery and seemed to enjoyed the 4 demos that we gave simultaneously. People went from wheel to wheel to see what we were making, all of us doing something different.

I think the four of us enjoyed giving the demonstrations as much as they enjoyed watching them. I will have to admit that it was a challenge for me because this was the first time throwing in front of so many people. I have had a lot of practice talking with Bruce in our studio here at home while throwing, but not so much in front of an audience.

Sam Taylor's Hands

Mark's Hands

Samantha's Hands

Bruce's Hands

Bruce's and Sam's Hands

This was Sam's idea.

Mark just finished editing a new book that will be coming out in August about Karen Karnes.

Can't wait to get our copy.

Pot Hop in Washington DC

Bruce Gholson, Sam Taylor, Mark Shapiro, Samantha Henneke

We had a great time this past weekend. Met new and wonderful people. It was such a thrill for Bruce and I. We have seen Mark's and Sam's work for years and it was a treat to meet the artists behind the pots. We brought home some of their work for our collection. Bruce is holding one of Mark's mugs in his hands. We had to slow down our visits to Sam and Mark next door because we kept wanting to bring something new back with us.

Below is our work displayed in the home of our hosts, Cass Johnson and Matt Radford. They were incredibly generous, and we thank them muchly for their warm hospitality. They had this amazing garden, and now that I am home I thought I had taken more pictures of it, but I only have a few. I was totally taken by their beautiful roses, and they had such a sweet scent. I sat in their garden and relaxed for quite a while examining our pots making future creative decisions.

We passed out Seagrove maps and found many people excited about visiting us and the other potteries in the future. There were many that have heard of Seagrove and wondered if it was the center? Well, we are all the center of our own universe I think, and well yes frankly we are very near the geographic center of North Carolina. There is a marker around 5 miles south of us in Star.

We set up a table in Cass and Matt's garden. I like how our crystalline looks in the day light.

Here I am (below) in their living room. A beautiful baby grand that was refurbished and put back together. Thinking back, I should of tried sitting at it, but I'm not sure why I did not. One of these days I will pull out my electric piano from its case. Not quite the exquisite piece of furniture that Matt and Cass have. I played the piano when I was a kid and Ed and Gloria replaced our piano with an electric one when I went to college. I love listening to music and picking out the piano chords.

Here are a few of our pots out in the garden.

Wonderful windows that lets the light in and views of the garden.

We hopped on down to Sam's and Mark's place frequently, where their host was Mark's sister, Judy and husband Rick. Sam has a wonderful selection of t-shirts. We recognized the creator of the images on Sam's shirts as an artist by the name of Ray Troll. We need to get some new fishy, skull, and fossil shirts for Bruce. Marks and Sam's pots were interspersed with each others on the shelves, it was a great mix.

Here is a selection of Mark's work. Another slender Tall bottle maker. They remind me of Cycladic Sculpture.

There are more pictures on our Bulldog Pottery Facebook page if you would like to see some more images.
We were at Hinckley Pottery Saturday night for simultaneous demos. More pictures to come in next post.