unit 4

a goal I was keen to achieve during A-Level was to gain a new skill every project and in unit four (my final unit!!) I decided the new skill I was going to learn was......ceramics! Prior to this my experience has not gone any deeper than painting gaudi-esque figures in art in year 7 and how half of the clay pieces in my class managed to explode in the kiln. I was motivated purely from seeing Grayson Perrys beautiful clay pots when I went to his exhibition at the victoria miro in summer.

school was really undermining, restrictive and tried to do everything in their power to put me off. "we dont have any of that clay" "we dont know how the kiln works" "this is going to be harder than you think" "you aren't in degree you know" "we threw out all the oxides" ECT repeat x10000 it was ridiculous and saddening and disheartening and nothing like how teachers should be. the school system and my teachers let me down big time and now they are really excited about my pots and really like my work and taking all the credit for helping me which makes it even worse.

regardless, i rung up a bunch of places asking for help, guidance  anything and one late sunday afternoon Karen called me and answered all my questions. 

I obviously had loads to learn, slips/oxides/clays/the kiln/etching ect ect here are my results

i coiled my pots and they took a very very long time but with good results, I then mixed up a bucket of red slip and dunked them both in before leaving to dry. For some reason some grog appeared on the surface of the slip (the horrible sandpaper texture you can see on the top of the pot above) so i had to remix and reslip both pots which is difficult as you can only do half at once to combat getting yr fingers on the slip.

rubbish phone pictures but once eched through the white clay is exposed. Influences + inspiraton: agony in the garden combined with the modern social issue of the misrepresentation of women in the media. Depicted is a woman on a cliff-face preying to a cosmopolitain magazine whilst her peers lay exhausted, unable to live up to the ridiculous  unrealistic expectations of women. Surrounding them are the words "DO YOU FEEL LIBERATED" as well as "Happiness" "Beauty" "Sex"

women shouldn't have to put their happiness on the line to be considered beautiful and sexual to men.

Agony In The Garden - Giovanni Bellini