New Work Taken to The Dart Gallery, December 19th 2017

Here are photos of new pieces dropped off at The Dart Gallery in downtown Dartmouth last week, starting with a group shot to give an idea of relative size of the pieces:

The gallery is looking fantastic with all sorts of wonderful local pottery and jewelry, a show of fun pieces inspired by Pixar and many great cards and prints.  The gallery also has a handy storage with many great pieces from previous shows. 

For folks who would enjoy some delicious food and drink with their Christmas shopping, or are just looking for an artsy holiday outing, Dart is adjacent to Picnic at Dart, a licensed bistro under the direction of a very creative chef who trained at Le Cordon Bleu Culinary School.   

The gallery's neighbourhood has also been hailed in the national news media this year as "Halifax's Brooklyn" as downtown Dartmouth turns into a popular indie shopping/dining destination. 

On to the work!  First, a bunny and mouse holding flowers, which could hold rings for safe keeping:

  
 Next up: an owl and pussycat sculptures.

  
For Chinese astrology fans, next year will be the Year of the Brown (or Earth) Dog, beginning February 16th, 2018.   I didn't realize this when sculpting or glazing this basset hound and corgi:  

Next are bunnies with their hedgehog friend: a bowl, sculpture and figurines.  One accidentally ended up with a coat that looks similar to Huxley, the gallery bunny - a glazing "mistake" that ended up being an improvement:

Elephants! A small bowl and a figurine, with trunks turned upwards for good luck, ready to shower good fortune on passers by:

Four more figurines, a frog, cat, German Shepherd dog, and raccoon:

Three chickens, a goat and a rooster.

Four crows:

Four sheep and four foxes:

Next, a selection of handsculpted brooches and pendants!  These are brand new products for my art practice.   First, the brooches, with a loonie (Canadian dollar coin) for scale.  These are a bit big but suitable for a jacket, coat or bag, I'll be making smaller ones in the new year:

Next, the pendants.

Suggested musical pairings: for the flying crow pendants:  "As the Crow Flies" by Stephen Fearing. For the pig pendant, "The Grim Trucker" by Ron Sexsmith.

In addition to the twenty pendants above, there was a mushroom pendant I didn't manage to get a photo of. 

Finally here is a high relief carved bowl of a fox chasing a pheasant:

 

New Work Taken to Made in The Maritimes, December 19, 2017

Here are pics of new sculptures which were dropped off last week at Made in the Maritimes Artisan Boutique's Hydrostone location.

Huge thanks to Joel for carrying my work for the first time at this most busy time of the year! This iconic business supports a multitude of Maritime makers at two excellent Halifax retail locations (The Hydrostone Market and Sunnyside Mall) as well as via their online shop.

All of these pieces are cone 6 stoneware, and were fired in my electric kiln with a variety of commercial and studio-mixed glazes, underglazes, stains and slips.  They range in price from $35 for the smaller figurines to $225 for the largest sculptures.  

Although I often work in series, these are all 'one offs' as I do not use molds, stamps, stencils or transfers of any kind.   

First up are 6 larger sculptures:

This fox is approximately the size of a large pineapple (I think), and is the tallest piece of the group.

Moose.

 Skunk holding flower with "Om" symbol carved into its haunch, rabbit holding flower with yin yang on haunch, "peace pig" and a sheep.

 Another view of the pig, which has a flower on its other haunch:

A look at the flowers the skunk and bunny are holding.  These were initially intended to be 'ring dishes'.

Next are two seagulls, a lobster, a whale and a shark:

Four fox figurines:

 Four sheep:

 Four crows:

Four Blanding's turtles.  This is a threatened species in Nova Scotia and the subject of habitat conservation campaigns by the Nova Scotia Nature Trust:

Four bears:

Three birds: (a chickadee, robin and bluebird)

Squirrel, deer and buffalo:

Four goats (three billy and one nanny), four chickens and a rooster.  When sculpting the chickens I thought if they were an Ikea item I would name them "Bok Bok" after the sounds real chickens make.

 And finally a couple of Easter chicks and Thanksgiving turkeys.

That's it!  Three cheers for everyone supporting the buy local movement this holiday season!

Kiln Unloading, 2017!

Howdy! Over the weekend of Dec 9/10, I fired off a bunch of new stoneware pieces.  

Here are a few favourite pics from the firing, with three additional posts to be posted in the next couple of days: one each for Jenny Jib, Dart Gallery and I am very excited to announce that Made in the Maritimes Artisan Boutique will be carrying my work.  In the new year I'll also have new work at the Art Gallery of Nova Scotia shop. 

First up, for Made in the Maritimes, four Blanding's turtles:

 And four larger sculptures, a skunk and rabbit holding flowers, the peace pig and a sheep:

These are eight of many sculptures dropped off at Made in the Maritimes last week, mostly smaller figurines, with more photos to come.

We had a dusting of snow on Thursday which made for some fun wintry photos of pieces that went to Jenny Jib in Lunenburg.  Here are a few pics:

Flying eagle hanging on a tree:

A "large" fox sculpture.  In 2018 I resolve to start including measurements on this blog:

 

There were more pieces, including plates, a few ornaments, figurines and some "one of a kind" stoneware pendants and brooches - a first for my art practice.  I took an assortment of each to both Jenny Jib and Dart Gallery.  Here are a few pics from the pieces at Jenny's. 

 Brooches:

Thanks to Sharon of the Potters Guild exec for the brooch pins and tutorial this summer.  The pin backs are glued with E-6000 glue, which is supposed to be very strong.  I've been testing a flower brooch on my coat and so far so good.

And a pic of a few of the pendants which are at Jenny Jib.  Two Christmas trees and a lobster, more pics to come in a separate blog post.

These pendants have their 'findings' built into the piece, as inspired by Clairvoyant Art Glass pendants from New Brunswick which I like very much and have been wearing for years.  Like theirs, my pendants are also on adjustable leather cord, finished with two sliding knots.  I left bits hanging out so the knots don't unravel but if they do, where I'm new to this, here's a very short youtube tutorial on how to retie them.


Meanwhile for Dart Gallery here is a group shot of an assortment sculptures and two bowls:

A close up of the elephant figurine and bowl, trunks raised upwards for good luck, ready to shower good fortune on all who walk past:

And some of the hand-sculpted stoneware pendants on adjustable leather cords which I took to Dart.    There are some brooches as well, more pics to come in another post!

This (Past Twenty-Two) Week's Favourite Things! Monday May 22nd - Sunday October 23rd, 2017

1.   Research topic: everything to do with the human gallbladder.   There are a lot of articles and videos online about gallstones how to naturally cleanse the gallbladder, which is important for the roles it plays in fat metabolism as well as thyroid function. Thanks to the western diet and stress, it is common for it to get jammed up with sludge and stones.  In one of the many articles I read someone compares gallbladder removal to removing a beeping smoke alarm from a burning house - while surgery may be necessary at times, best case scenario would likely be to cleanse the thing naturally before problems arise.  Here is an article:
Healing the Gallbladder with Chinese Medicine

2.  What the Dairy Industry Doesn't Want You To Know  Full Talk by Neal Barnard MD (youtube)

3.  Dr. McDougall - you're fired!  youtube video  to quote the description on youtube: "Dr. McDougall was kicked out of the Obesity Medicine Conference. But he's one of the leading weight loss experts in the world. What happened?"

4.  Bodhisattva Vow by the Beastie Boys.  According to Wikipedia, MCA practiced Buddhism and supported the Tibetan Independence Movement

5.  The Tibetan Freedom Concert album

6.  All Wars Are Bankers Wars - A Very Clear Pattern Throughout History.  Youtube video

7.  Gut Health - Effects of Glyphosate and Antibiotics.  informative blog post about how a pesticide used on GMO crops can impact human health, especially endocrine (gland) function.

8.  What I Wish Someone Had Told Me in Medical School About Nutrition.  Youtube video lecture by Michael Klaper MD.

9.   The Real Causes of Poverty youtube video

10.  Alan Watts youtube videos including:  Life is NOT a Journey,    and, Alan Watts: Full Unedited Version of 'Conversation with Myself'. and, Alan Watts: Most epic speech of all time.

11.  CBC article from June 15: Coffee outlet's Canada 150 message adds reminder about Indigenous history, Just Us! Coffee Roasters in Grand Pré, N.S., changed its billboard on Monday as a reminder of how long this land has been inhabited: "Canada 150. Mi'kma'ki 13,000."

12.  Videos from the 'Awaken with JP' youtube channel including: How To Get Offended, and Coconut Oil Kills (which makes fun of the grass seed, aka 'vegetable', oil industries)

13. Movies:   A Knight's Tale 
Ever After
Why Him? 

14.  Aesop's Tale: The Lion With Bad Breath.  This link goes to a cool website called 'Long Long Time Ago stories for you' which has all of Aesop's Tales and many other stories.

15.  Life is easy.  Why do we make it hard?  Ted Talk by Jon Jandai  (youtube)

16.   Quote by Ralph Waldo Emerson:  "Adopt the pace of nature: her secret is patience."

I took a break from art the past few months but am back at underglazing, with a firing coming asap.

Studio Update! May 25th, 2017

I've been sculpting away,  and really enjoying it.  Here are just a few pics of some pieces in progress, there's more, so I'll have to start underglazing as I'm out of places to put things. 

A small herd of Blanding's turtles; I've wanted to make some for awhile, this charming turtle is endangered in Nova Scotia.   This past Tuesday May 23 was "World Turtle Day".  I learned recently that turtles are a celestial animal in feng shui and symbolize protection.

 A few of a bunch of brooches: the fishes are going to be a yin yang and after I carved them I realized they are carp; apparently pairs of carp are lucky in feng shui.  

 A couple of goats and a few chickens.  We keep talking about getting goats and chickens one day so I decided to make some, way less maintenance.

 As well as a few more bunnies holding flowers, waiting for a precious ring or ashes from a fine smokeable, here is a skunk holding a flower with an Om symbol carved into its haunch.  This is one of my favourite things I've ever made and has me all excited about the next firing already!

Same skunk with a few flower brooches which are super fun to make.  With the sculptures becoming increasingly time consuming I'm planning to have handsculpted brooches, pendants and flat ornaments as my lower price point objects, where they're quicker to make.  

There's a shark in the background, other figurines I didn't photograph include sharks, whales, seagulls, lobsters, dogs and turkeys.  There are a few larger figures including an owl and a pussycat, a couple of dogs and a fish.  The next post will probably be of the finished work; if all goes well there will be quite a bit!

This (Past Three) Week's Favourite Things! Monday May 1st - Sunday May 21st, 2017

1. Vancouver Sun article about a non-profit that links developers with undeveloped property with urban gardeners: Vancouver community gardens a gift from developers who get a tax break.  

2. The Guardian article:  Swedish city builds 'passive houses' as part of ambitious CO2 reduction targets

3.   10 reasons you should be drinking pine needle tea

4.  Edible Wild Food blog posts: Winter Survival Food: Winter Teas
and
 Recycle your Christmas tree - drink it!

5.  "Silicon Hali" a Coast article from 2012, I hadn't heard this play on Silicon Valley before with respect to Halifax but here is an article comparing the two places: "Why a tech company chose Halifax  over Silicon Valley".   

As an aside here is a youtube doc about housing prices in Silicon Valley: Million Dollar Shack: Trapped in Silicon Valley's Housing Bubble  

6.  The Crushing Cancer Kitchen website, stumbled across this looking for a recipe that uses sprouted lentils

7.  Truth Never Told youtube videos: 55. Delete Facebook
and  the 5 stages of awakening

 8.   The entire NutritionFacts.org youtube channel by Dr. Michael Greger, including this video on resistant starch:  Getting Starch to take the Path of Most Resistance

9.   The "What I've learned" youtube channel including:

Everything Wrong With "The System" (Educate yourself)

Why Your Body Makes You Fat and Hungry 

Food Industry's Secret Weapon (WHY sugar is addictive and in 80% of food)

The Story of Fat: why we were wrong about health

10.  That Sugar Film, now on Canadian Netflix, this was a very educative, entertaining Australian film on the dangers of consuming too much sugar, prevalent in so-called "health foods".  I learned about it when mentioned in the video about sugar from the channel above.

11. post: 10 habits that are more harmful than you think

12. In Defense of Food: documentary based on Michael Pollan's book
currently on Canadian Netflix

13. 80/10/10 youtube video: Does Dairy Really Cause Cancer? Dr. Michael Klaper

14. Important Message - Infinite Waters youtube video

15. Bob Proctor: How to Find Your Passion and Use Law of Attraction. youtube interview with Jake Ducey from April 2017

16.  Dr. Michael Greger "How Not To Die" Talks at Google on Youtube

17. Dr. Mercola interviewing Dr. Greger on How Not To Die (youtube video)

18.  webpage:  Feng Shui: Five Celestial Animals

This Week's Favourite Things! Monday April 24th - Sunday April 30th, 2017

1.  This 2 minute Infinite Waters youtube video

2.  The entire Fitness Blender youtube channel, props to these people adapting to the internet age to make a home based business which must be profitable what with all their views and subscribers, while helping people for free.  Great stuff for people who want to work out at home without any gym membership or equipment.  

3.  Halifax has a summer opera festival, and there's a group called Opera Nova Scotia - cool

4.  Youtube videos about materialism/consumerism: 

The Trap of Materialism - UK documentary, the next two youtube videos use some clips from this as well as lots of other stuff

Escape! From the cult of materialism by Fair Wind Films 

Consumerism 

5.  A Simpler Way: Crisis as opportunity (2016) Free Full Documentary.  This is about a bunch of people who came together in a simple community in the woods in Australia, including folks quitting desk jobs.  It describes challenges of the plan as well.  The entire youtube channel Happen Films has other interesting docs about permaculture and forest gardening.

6.  Mud Jeans.  This European company is described in the Consumerism film above and presents a very creative, stylish, ethical, resource-efficient solution for clothing people in manner they call the "circular economy". 

7.  This coming week's Doreen Virtue angel card reading on youtube includes a coupon code early on for a very nice free 1 hour video on healing addictions, which draws on her experience as a psychologist