Annual Mug Shot

Hurried annual mug shot, which doesn't include the ones which sold at Scare LA.

Still pretty cool, though, even though I would have changed a few things...

A last Raku firing today, before the show, so there will be more! Mugs are cooling in the kiln, along with some shot glasses...

Yes. It's crazy around here! But it's the best season of all! :D

2013 Jack Season is Creeping In

Jennifer A. contacted me through my ShellHawk's Creations Facebook Page and asked if I could make a certain pumpkin royalty jack-o'-lantern for her. Of course, I said, "YES!"

It took me a while to get to him. I had a bunch of stuff to clear up before I could get him thrown on my wheel. I made him a few friends, too, so he wouldn't be lonely in the kiln.

I had to fire him twice, because I just wasn't satisfied with him the first time. The finished guy is in the above picture, on the far left. I got him wrapped up and shipped almost as soon as he cooled. 

Now, not only was Jennifer patient about waiting for jack, she was even kind enough to send me a picture of him all lit up!

That's definitely going into the "My Pumpkins in Their New Homes" photo album on Facebook! Looking at that album is definitely a "ShellHawk's Jacks Evolution Through the Years" kind of thing. Wow, has my style changed!

Next up, making some goodies for West Coast Haunters Convention. After the El Dorado Hills Art and Wine Affaire show next weekend, that is! (You know it's high class, because it's got that "e" hanging off the end!) You are coming out, right? :)

Raku Crop

I did several Raku kiln loads today, with the help of a very good clay buddy. I am officially tired! 

Official pics tonight. They'll go in the Etsy shop later this week.

New Jacks Are Coming

Here's one of the guys I got out of the Raku firing a few weeks ago. He will soon have more friends!

Works in Progress

 It's been a busy week in the studio and out of it, too! I've been working on several projects at one time, because sometimes I'm able to complete more things that way; when one piece is drying, I can be glazing something else. When the glaze firing is going (making the studio unbearably hot in already overly-hot weather) I can be inside, working on a sculpture. It's a bit crazy-making, but it seems to work for me.


I decided to throw in a couple of bigger-ticket Hallowe'en items this year, the first being the above-pictured porcelain punch bowl and ten cups. Porcelain is an interesting clay. Aside from being exceedingly fussy and hard to throw because it has no grog in it, everything contaminates it and shows, even after firing. That includes oils from handling and all other residue from other clays. 


Which brings me to how I nearly murdered my older, idiot dog.


Because porcelain has no grog, it can actually be carved when it's bone-dry if you throw it thickly enough. (If you try to carve other, grogged clays, the grog actually shows up and can scratch the surface of the piece.) I threw the bowl above with the idea of carving a haunted house on it, and carving various appropriate themes on the coordinating cups.


So, a couple of days ago, I'm out in my garage, wearing my respirator (hot) and wearing my latex surgical gloves (really freaking hot) so I don't contaminate the clay with the oils from my hands, and I have the bowl lying on a towel on my lap. I am sweating buckets, but I Am An Artist, and I am willing to Suffer For My Art. It is 108° in the studio. I am carving over a bucket of water to keep the dust to a minimum. I carve a little, then take a soft brush and brush away the powdered clay so I can see to carve more.


Idiot dog walks in. He normally doesn't want to be in the studio much, but that day, he made an exception. He lays down for a little bit, then notices the neighbors across the street messing with their car in their driveway.


Ooo! Something interesting is happening! The ears perk.


He gets up, somehow dipping his tail in the bucket I use for reclaiming my red clay.


He walks forward to the baby gate I keep across the door to keep the dogs from dashing outside, recognizes the people across the street, and begins to wag. His. Tail!


I have been completely, utterly focused on carving my bowl. I have not noticed that idiot dog has dipped his tail in the Red Death of Porcelain Clay (a bucket of water and red clay that I will reclaim later). 


I hear splattering noises as his tail wags oh-so-slightly faster. Small red splatters appear inside my porcelain bowl. Screaming and ranting ensues, and idiot dog is banished from the studio, looking baffled.


I set the bowl down and take a deep breath, muttering threats about dogs becoming rugs so they would actually be useful, for once. I take another breath and examine the bowl. I realize that there are, by some miracle, no huge chunks of Red Death of Porcelain clay in the bowl. The splatters are little more than red colored water. If I let it dry, I can gently sand it off. I won't actually have to throw the entire bowl away.


The idiot dog has no idea how lucky he is. He has, however, rubbed his tail in numerous places all over the house, to the dismay of our housekeeper, who had just cleaned all of those places. I dragged him outside and hosed off the offending tail while seriously considering bobbing it myself and saving myself a vet bill...

Meanwhile, work continues. I am glazing the chandelier and the matching globes, and if I get it finished this weekend, I may be able to open the kiln on Sunday morning. The pumpkins in the above shot (with the exception of the top middle one, which has already been fired) are drying and awaiting final touch-ups before their first firing. I have a small witch sculpture I'm working on, and work on Raven continues. (We can rebuild him! We have the technology!)


So, happy Friday the 13th, boils and ghouls. I'm off to glaze some jacks! I leave you with this track from Sinister 6, which will be on the upcoming Halloween at High Noon album coming out in October. I can hardly wait!

New in the Shop

New copper jack-o'-lantern in my ShellHawk's Creations Etsy store. More will be added in weeks to come, so keep an eye out!


And remember, if you're a Hauntcast subscriber, you get a special 15% discount!

Happy 4th and Other Things!

Happy 4th of July, everyone! I hope it's wonderful, safe and full of great friends and great food!


In other news this here pumpkin came out of Monday's Raku firing:

I put him in my Etsy story this morning, and he was gone in less than five minutes. He's going to go live with Chris and Jeff Davis and their brood of kitties!


I got a few disappointed posts on that one, so I'll be making more of the Raku variety with evil faces similar to this guy. Later today or tomorrow, I'll be putting another jack from Monday's firing in the shop, so keep an eye out.


Lastly, I guess no one is interested in a giveaway, because I'm still not hitting that 260 follower mark. Sad panda. I was in a giving mood. *dramatic sigh*

New Shop Pumpkins

Off to make some more! Meanwhile, buy at ShellHawk's Creations!

(Almost Spring) Cleaning, Part Deux

As I mentioned yesterday, Sunday was a pretty productive day. The studio space got about as cleared out as it can get for the time being, and I got some throwing done. Since I'm re-learning how to throw from my new teacher, I feel like I'm going back to being almost as bad as I was when I first started throwing. Of course, that's my own "monkey mind" messing with me and undermining my confidence, muttering about how nothing I make is good enough.  (I'm not fishing for compliments, I'm just sharing how silly that monkey mind is, and how we should learn to ignore it!)

Of course, I have only to go back to the pictures I took of my very first season of making pumpkins to see how much of a liar that other mind is! (I swear, I saw these at the Davis's house and just cringed! Thanks, Chris, for supporting a beginning artist!) The other two are still too wet to carve, thanks to the cold, wet weather, but I hope to take another run at them today.

In all honesty, I'm very pleased that I'm going back to the beginning now, before I develop any more bad habits. We all know that the longer we do things incorrectly, the harder it is to change. My teacher is half Japanese and after he got his MFA, went back to Japan to train there for awhile. For those not in the know, Japanese pottery is pretty freaking amazing, and in certain areas is still taught the same way it was taught 1000 years ago.

I also took the time to break out my  plaster of Paris and pour up my life cast. Yes, those are the hairs that were yanked out in the process of pulling off the silicone mold.

I showed it to Mr. ShellHawk and got a similar reaction to that scene in Beetlejuice. While he complimented me on how well it turned out, he had some reservations.

"I'm fascinated and freaked out, all at the same time," he told me. He also told me to please keep it in the garage so he didn't have to see it. Oh, well.

So the question I have to throw out to you all is, how do I make a cast of this that will stand on its own, without having to invest in various latex chemicals, etcetera? I'd like to use it for a Madame Leota effect, like Mr. Chicken's, so that requires it to stand like a wig head, I assume. I actually got a little projector from Woot!, so I'm pretty sure I can get everything synced up once I get one of my friends to film me doing the Madame Leota spiel. I plan to take a Dremel tool and smooth down the eyelids, to give it that open-eye look, but maybe that's not the best idea. I don't know!

Thanks in advance for your feedback on this. This is the first cast I'll be working on, as well as my first projection effect.

(Almost Spring) Cleaning



Josey supervises the Great Studio Cleanup 2011

This past weekend, I took some time away from my latest sculpture to clean out my studio space.



Lacking the cabinets I would dearly love to have, this is about as clean as it gets, for now. I can walk without tripping over debris. There's a minimal amount of clay dust, because I washed down and mopped the floor.



Why is that important? I plan to work with clay for a very long time, and the thought of developing silicosis is horrifying. It's an occupational hazard for potters and other folks who work in clay for long periods of time, so I am really conscious of maintaining a low clay dust level in my work space. Dog hair is another, less harmful, matter! ;o)

I managed to go through a bunch of the "mystery clay" I had inherited from the guy who sold me my ceramics setup. The various clays were rock-hard, and though I can reconstitute them by throwing them into buckets of water and re-wedging them, the fact is, I only have so much space to work with. Taking up more floor space with buckets is just not worth it!

The neat thing about going through the old clay was finding the ones I am willing to reconstitute, i.e., the ones with actual labels on them! I ran across a cone 10 porcelain, which is a great find. Maybe I'll get to that later this year.

Meanwhile, I started playing with some new pumpkin pots for the upcoming season. Thanks to my new teacher, whom I love and wish I had known about sooner, I am now able to make some very simple lidded forms. Here's a picture of the ones I threw Sunday, unfinished, of course. They have to dry a bit before I can trim them and carve the faces. These will be Raku jack-o'-lanterns, so start saving your pennies for when they go up on my Etsy store!

More studio adventures to share tomorrow! (And let's face it, if I post about the studio, you won't have to hear about The Great Puppy Saga of 2011! ;o))

New Pumpkins on Etsy!

Hey, All! I just listed a bunch of new pumpkins on Etsy, so head over to ShellHawk's Creations and get yourself a Halloween treat!

ShellHawk's Creations-New Additions to the Shop

The bat bowl and a few other things have been added to the shop, so head over! I'll be adding the tombstone salt and pepper shakers this afternoon, too, so keep an eye out!

Shop News!

Just wanted to let you all know I'm offering free shipping in my Etsy shop this weekend only, so please! Take advantage of me!

Oh, and while you're scouting around my Etsy store, take a minute to head over to the Davis Graveyard's new Etsy shop for your tombstone needs!

My Graveyard Delights Treasury on Etsy.
My Skulls and Bones Treasury on Etsy.
My Cocktails, Anyone? Treasury on Etsy.

Night Shots

I promised some night shots of the new guys, so here they are. The jacko below will be a hanger when he's finished.

Here's a quick shot of my photographic assistant, who is normally very camera-shy (upper right part of the frame). She's very helpful in keeping the lens clean with her tongue!

Since there seems to be a good response to these new additions, I'll make more to put in the store in the next couple of weeks. I also want to let you all know that prices in the shop will be going up in the middle of September, so if you like the ones already there, buy them soon!

Screamin' Scott asked if I would have some of these jack-o-lanterns available in the shop, so I guess I'll have to make some more like them, too!

Back to playing in the studio!

Time is Running Out!

The Summer Pumpkin Giveaway is almost over, so if you want to win one, please be sure to enter now! Click the highlighted words for info!

Faces for Show

I've been playing with making some new faces and making a few of my pots more "pumpkin-y." I've also been trying out new glazes, and one client wanted a radically different, non-pumpkin glaze.

I have so much to get done before the Fine Arts Festival, it's crazy! But I think these guys are a good start.

Giveaway update

I noticed that I have a few new anonymous followers and wanted to let them know my Summer Pumpkin Giveaway is going on right now! Click the highlighted words for details!

If you Anonymous followers would like to enter, please leave a comment on the original post so I can enter you in the upcoming drawing!

Also, I did a dumb thing and didn't realize I would be in Chicago this Friday, so giveaway winners will be announced on Monday!

Good luck!

Giveaway? Alright...

Since I now have one hundred forty-one followers, I shall have to keep my word and pull together a giveaway! Give me a day or two to see which jackos I'm going to give away and we'll get the ball rolling. I will include my new mini-pumpkins somehow, as well...

What I know for sure is that for every ten "I want it" comments I get on the giveaway post (not counting the ones that tell me that someone's posted on their blog or that they're a new Twitter or Facebook follower, etc), I will give out one more item.

Stay tuned!

Oh, and P.S. Thanks and welcome to the new follwers who made the upcoming giveaway possible!

Hmm...

Maybe I'll do a pumpkin pot giveaway when I reach 140 followers...

Only 142 Shopping Days Left Until Hallows!

A few new guys in the shop, and I've created the "Hanging" section. You really, really, need one of these! And my Raku guys need new homes, too, so take a gander and fall in love!