Studio Update: Week of 10/9/23

This week started off with the Indiana Clay Conference over the weekend. We were lucky to get housing covered by the university so that made it super accessible to us. A group of us left about 6am on Saturday morning and made the drive out to Bloomington, where the conference was held. The conference was mush smaller than NCCECA but very good and informative all the same. We got to see some really good demonstrations, my favorites included Pete Pinnell and Stephanie Galli. Stephanie mentioned that she wraps her tool's handles in many layers of tattoo gauze so that when she holds them, they are bigger and conform to the shape of her grip. This will help with hand pain when decorating for long hours. I am so grateful for that tip because my hands have been hurting worse than ever recently and I need to find ways to ease that pain. Pete had some really good tricks, including microwaving wet work to get them closer to leather hard. Wow!!!!! I found bits of information that I needed in all the talks I attended and even some encouragement to feel confident as an artist and to not let imposter syndrome hold me back from pushing forward to bigger things. We saw the accompanying shows on IU Bloomington's campus and both the shows and the campus were beautiful. The campus made me feel like Rory Gilmore ( If you know you know) lol. I loved the Bloomington area and it definitely made me want to consider grad school again.

Back in the studio again after the conference, I got back to work with decorating and started to think a lot about what being confident in my work would look like. This week I heard back from two shops in Louisville that are interested in buying a batch of work either whole sale or consignment. It's a really good feeling, and it came at a perfect time to launch me into a time of making, selling, and pushing forward with confidence. Later in the week, some studio mates and I got to work on making over 60 pots for an upcoming sale at a coffee shop. We are hoping to do 4 different fundraising sales to cover NCCECA before march. It's a tight schedule but it might be doable. Molly wedged somewhere over 60 balls of clay and then me and GH took about 2 hours and threw all of them into mug, latte and cortado sized cups.

Image 1: Indiana Clay conference or Witch Fest? Choose Wisely

Image 2: a sunrise from the hotel room in Bloomington

Image 3: Fun snacks at the reception

Image 4: A plate I really liked at the reception

Image 5: A little guy!!

Image 6: I loved this work, and I loved the accompanying artist talk

Image 7: Me and GH getting ready to throw a LOT of pots

Image 8: a lot of pots in progress