Interview with OPP

I was just featured as an artist and was interviewed on the Other People's Pixels blog.

Follow the link to read my interview!

Real update soon, I promise.

My Etsy Store is Open!

You can now help support me as an artist on Etsy!

Jennifer Koch Ceramics on Etsy

I have functional and affordable pottery for sale.  I may add other things like jewelry.  I have yet to decide if I want to list my sculptures. Comes down to the whole art versus craft conundrum. I feel that listing them could also cheapen what I'm doing with them. They serve a purpose and are not meant to be decorative objects for the home. So we'll see.
But, please consider purchasing my functional ware as a way to help support the work I am MOST passionate about.

It's like opening a Christmas present and discovering you got socks

There's always this push and pull mixture of excitement and dread before you open the door of a recently fired kiln. Will your work be perfect, just the way you set it in the kiln? Will it be in tiny shattered bits all over the kiln floor and beyond repair? Will it have a few cracks? Or finally, will the cracks be enormous? There are countless other possibilities that I'm sure I'm forgetting but I'm sure you get the idea.  

Well, Momma bah didn't make it.  But, on the bright side, she should be an easy repair. 

The crack wraps all the way around her body, but it's clean and nothing shattered off. There are some big cracks that run lengthwise on either half but I should be able to fill it in with something.  I've been using wood putty but it's terrible and comes off really easily with water.  I'm open to suggestions, if you have them?

Baby bah did make it though! Hooray! I forgot to check her for small cracks, but she's solid. I was too preoccupied with analyzing Momma sheep's break.

The firing it's self went great! Slow and steady, so I don't think there's any thing I could change there.
I think if I attempt this scale again, and I likely will, I'll have to change how I build. (I don't think I said how big she was in the last post, but she's almost 5 in length).  I'll probably try firing it in two or three pieces and assemble post firing.  There's less chance for hairline fractures to get out of control that way. I think the weight of this piece and the warping created a lot of cracks I wasn't able to see.  I might even throw in a few structural supports, though I'm not so keen on them.  I'm fairly convinced they cause more cracking.  Maybe if I cut them out as part of the shell when I hollow it out, instead of inserting them after I hollow out the piece.


C'est la vie!

June and July Studio wrap up

This has quite possibly been the busiest and most progressive summer I've ever had in the studio!  I think I'm still working off the momentum and accomplishments that I've made over the past year.  I've gotten used to just constantly being busy and I think I really enjoy it.  Ive had a few days of down time this week, while I waited for some work to dry for a bisque firing, and I actually got bored! August may not end up being time off from the studio like I planned if I'm going to be bored with nothing else to do.

What have I done? Well, first let me preface this with the fact that it takes me about 3 weeks per piece just to build. So it might not seem like a lot, but it is! Nothing has been surfaced yet, I may not get that done until August.

Below is a sculpture I actually started at the end of April but wasn't able to finish and fire  until June because of the chaos involved in setting up my BFA show and graduating, etc. The baby lamb will be scaling a fence (or something similar), so picture her vertical.  The Momma sheep's head will be mounted on a wall above and to the right of the baby lamb. I think I'm going to attempt to glaze some of the surface of this pair.

In June, I started my biggest piece yet! A full size Momma sheep that has a baby lamb as its pair.

Which obviously had some issues... I went home for the day and the next morning I found this.

After I patched it back together, I stuffed it full of dowels in a grid to help support the clay.  I also rigged up a better support for the back end, made out of bricks. Gravity and I  were at odds for several weeks.  This piece took a little more than 250LBs of clay. I mixed 3 batches for the whole project, which totals 375LBs and I used almost all of it!

Below are the pictures of Momma sheep where she is essentially fully built.  I still hadn't cut her up, hollowed her out, reassembled her and done the finishing details. But you get the basic idea.

Baby bah! She is almost finished being built in the photos below. Missing ears...

The next three photos depict how I cut the piece up.  I had intended to photograph my entire process with this piece but I forgot to get pictures of the rest of the process! I was in a rush. Next time!

The hash marks on the cut ends are so I can line up the pieces correctly when I reassemble.  I also keep each leg on a separate piece of foam and label it; BL stands for Back Left, etc. You get the idea.

Here they are! Reassembled and loaded into the kiln.  

With the help of a friend, Momma sheep made it in safely.  But I attempted to load the Baby lamb in before she was dry enough and the front legs fell off! Thankfully it was an easy repair, since she was so damp.  Lesson learned.

I fired these girls yesterday and is went great from this side of the kiln.  Tomorrow I'll open the kiln and find out if Momma sheep made it.  There are no interior supports in her body cavity and I think that may have been a mistake.  I had A LOT of issues with warping and cracking when I reassembled her.  I did view her as an experiment, since I have never made anything so big.  I've already come up with possible fixes, but lets hope I don't have to use them.

I have one week left in the studio until I've got to be packed and moved out.  I'm hoping to have time to glaze and fire the first set of sheep.  I'm going to have to cold surface the second pair.  If Momma sheep makes it, there's no way I'm risking a second firing! I probably won't get to that until August though.  I've got to convince my father to let me have some space in the basement for finishing work.  My new space at the Craft Center will be about a quarter of what it is now.

More to come!

Baaah

Finally finished the baby merino! She took such a long time since this was my first try at a lamb. And those folds! Oh my, what a tedious venture! But I love that kind of work.

Not perfect. I need to work on the skin looking more flexible. It looks to stiff for my liking. She was good practice for the next piece though. I'll be doing a baby scaling a fence/pedestal to reach her mom. The sheep will be a head mounted on the wall. My faces seem to be improving, slowly, but it's getting there.

I've had to scale my work down a bit since the kiln access is questionable at this point. I need to have work finished for my show by the end of April, so I can't count on getting the kiln I need. I plan on returning to large scale ASAP though. The following piece will be full scale momma sheep and a lamb being pulling away from each other by invisible hands.

Amy

Gertrude

Elizabeth

Nicole

Finished work!

Finally finished the Windgate Fellowship application!!! Here are the images I submitted for my portfolio.

Calf #6

Just finished yesterday!

Apologies for the shaky video. Still learning how to use the camera.

Piglet #2

Just finished yesterday!

Trying out the video camera my little brother got me.

Calf #4

So, the studio space issue has been straightened out. One of the other wonderful Seniors graciously traded spots with me. So now it's back to work! This past week I finally finished up my 4th calf. A little behind schedule but hopefully there will be no more interruptions.

I had a lot of trouble getting her back together with the the cracking and repairs. So here's to hoping she doesn't fall apart in the kiln!

Calf # 3

This is the 3rd sculpture of my Senior Thesis project that I finished in July. She is supposed to have a companion that I should be starting next. She is about 2 and half feet tall and long. Terra cotta and synthetic Barnard/Blackbird blend, unfired in these images. For larger images, follow the link.

Calf # 2

This is my second sculpture for my Senior Thesis project. She was finished last fall and is a little over 3 feet long. Terra cotta and synthetic Barnard/Blackbird blend, unfired in this image. For larger images, follow the link.