Category Archives: Events

Where to find my work Holiday 2016

I will be selling my work in five places this holiday season. As always, in my etsy shop, just click on store at the top of this page to go there and see my wares.

Starting November 18,2016 and running through December 24 the Dayton Visual Art Center will be showcasing my work in their annual Holiday Gift Gallery. Here’s a link
http://daytonvisualarts.org/arttobuy-holiday-gift-gallery/

On Black Friday I will be starting a three day craft fair in downtown Cincinnati (Covington KY) sponsored by Ohio Designer Craftsmen. Nov 25-27. Stop by booth #328 for a 10% discount!
http://ohiocraft.org/craft-fairs/winterfair-cincinnati/

On December 2 and 3 I’ll be doing one last craft fair at the Dairy Barn in Athens, OHhttp://dairybarn.org/event-view/2016-holiday-bazaar/

As always my work is available year round at the Nelsonville Emporium in Nelsonville, OH and the Dairy Barn Arts Center in Athens, OH

EZ clean bird feeders just before the glaze firing

the same feeders all shiny and bright

“The River” exhibit at the Parkersburg Art Center

My work will be on view at the Parkersburg Art Center as part of “The River” a biennial juried exhibition. The exhibit runs from June 26 through August 6, 2016. An Opening Reception is on June 26 from 1-3 pm come join the fun!

Here are my three Fish sculptures that are in the show.

Silica Based Life Form Fish #3220

Silica Based Life Form
Fish #3439

Silica Based Life Form Fish #9277

All of these pieces are from my Silica Based Life Form Series that began in 2013 and continues to evolve.

Here is a link to the Parkersburg Art Center for more information.

http://www.parkersburgartcenter.org/

Women of Appalachia art exhibit 2015

This years Women of Appalachia Show has again gathered some very fine artwork made by women who live and work in the many counties of Appalachia. I’m proud to be apart of this traveling exhibit and I hope you can get to see the show and go to one of the poetry and short story performances.

These are the sculptures that I have in the show. There is a link to the website with more information at the end of this post.

OFF COURSE
glass, clay, stone,shell

Below are three of my Fish from the Silica Based Life Form series

http://www.womenofappalachia.com/

You can see this amazing show now at the Parkersburg Art Center, in the Multicultural Gallery in Baker Center, Athens Ohio from Jan 12 through April 30 2016 and at the Pump House Center for the Arts in Chillicothe from May 5 to ?

There is also a written word aspect to this show and three more readings will be held in December, March and May. These are real women telling their own stories and sharing their poetry.

migrating fish

My Silica Based Life Form Fish have really been getting around. This one just came home from the Zanesville Museum of Art’s 70th Ohio Exhibition.

The Fish below just landed at the Dairy Barn in Athens Ohio and will travel to Athens West Virginia and Athens Georgia over the next year as part of the Athens Voices Show Upcoming Exhibitions | Dairy Barn

Silica Based Life Form
Fish

Five more of my slumped glass sculptures will be moving from Parkersburg West Virginia to Athens Ohio as part of the Women of Appalachia Show

Women of Appalachia | Their Stories & Their Art Exhibition

In the Eye of the Storm

Silica Based Life Form
Flower

There’s an opening at the Dairy Barn January 16, 2015 from 5-7 pm and a reception for the Women of Appalachia Exhibit at the Multicultural Center in Athens Ohio March 13, 2015.

All of these sculptures are for sale if you live close enough we can negotiate the shipping charges.

Women of Appalachia

Scarred Woman

This work was recently juried into the fifth Women of Appalachia Art Exhibit on display in the Multicultural Center Art Gallery, Baker Center, Ohio University. The exhibit runs through December 10 Then I believe it moves on to Chillicothe, OH.

There will be two events with spoken word and musical work performed on Nov 1 and Nov 7 details at www.womenofappalachia.com

“Scarred Woman” above epitomizes the Appalachian woman who has been through the fire and may be marked by life but not broken. The resilience and creativity that my friends and neighbors bring to every day life is truly inspiring.

Paw Paw Green Man Sun

Paw Paw Green Man is also in the show hanging beside his sister.

The process for making my green men and women are basic hand building techniques. I start with a large lump of clay and form a shallow oval bowl shape about the size of a face. This is pretty thick and the sides are 2-3 inches tall. When the clay is ready, and this is crucial, it’s time to start pushing, pressing, shaving and adding clay to form a face. The clay needs to be pretty pliable for the first roughing in but not so soft as to collapse.

I use some photos of faces and my own face to get the proportions and I usually go large as the clay shrinks in the fire. I only need to do eyes, nose and mouth because the edges of the face are covered with leaves.

It takes a few days of a few hours each to finish the face. The clay is kept in a plastic bag so it will dry slowly. This allows for finer finishing at the end.

The leaves are cut from slabs of clay, using real leaves. A large Green Man can take up to 36 leaves.

The assembly has to be done on the kiln shelf as the bone dry piece is very fragile. After the piece is completely dry it is bisque fired, if it survives I either spray on stains for a soft finish or dip into glaze for a shiny finish. It is then fired again to a much higher temperature.

Raku Firing Demonstration

looking into a hot Raku Kiln

My first blog entry, ever. No pressure, what should I cover first.

How about Raku pottery and my Demo firing at the July Final Friday in Nelsonville Ohio. If you were there thanks for checking out my web site and I hope you won the raffle!!! I’m writing this the day before as I fire some of the pieces I made, today. There won’t be time Friday evening to do all the pots I made from the 50 lb box of Raku clay that I got from the Nelsonville Emporium last month. So far I have only broken one piece probably because it was too tall for the smoking chamber and I hit it with the lid when it was molten hot and in a fragile state. Well time has flown, the Raku firing was a great success! The weather was perfect, I had a great spot right next to the fountain. I didn’t blow up any pots and people were properly amazed to see a glowing orange pot being lifted out of the kiln & placed in sawdust where flames ensued. The Raku Raffle was won by Mike. He chose a blank pot, applied glaze by dipping into a 5 gallon bucket then shaking off the excess. He also loaded the pot into the kiln, then lifted out the hot pot and placed it in the smoke chamber. The results were fabulous with beautiful lustre colors.

Raku Kiln set up by the fountain

pulling out a red hot piece of pottery

washing off the ashes

things get really dramatic when the sun goes down

Here are some of the ware that was fired that evening.

C McDonough Designs

Throwin' clay and bailin' the hay!