Beamuse Designs

It is finally completed! But it has taken me more than a month to pen my thoughts down. Honestly, it was more of being busy in the real life with any bare time to sit down and share my experience. Nevertheless, since I am here I will also share on my currently work in progress!

So in this class I discovered the art of glazing. I was taught how to firstly prep the piece by smoothing the surface and later sponging it to make sure the piece doesn’t have dust that would prevent the glaze from sticking to the surface. Then came to prepping the glazing.

And once it had dried into the gas oven it goes for an over the night firing with the rest of the works. The final works were beyond exquisite!

#ceramic #clay #clayexpression #clayexpressionmalaysia #claymalaysia #ceramicarts #ceramiclovers #designdotmuses #claystories #pottery #potterylovers #potterymalaysia

First and foremost, I must admit that this art is going to me a while to conquer and master. Nevertheless, I told myself I am going to master it and I will. So moving forward, I am going to share the update on my previously completed clay works. They have all undergone their first firing and I was so elated when I received the text from my “guru” telling me – “Your homework has survived the first firing!” It was truly the best thing ever!

Truth be told, I was so afraid that my clock tower was not going to make it through. But seeing that it survived the first firing makes me even happier. Now I truly need to plan the colour scheme for it and begin to make some place at home for displaying.

That said, what was the lesson for the week. This week was focused on coiling upwards and blending the walls to smoothed into a pottery. I decided to make a pairing of cup and bowl.

The hardest part was controlling the coiling as the try to manage the shape requires not only patience but a firm and unshaken hand. The cup did not turn out the way I hoped but it will do for now.

The next thing I learnt was spiralling the handles. Now that was truly tricky, I had to work really fast so as to avoid it from drying too quickly and from splitting. So to touch it up finally, I decided to drip off some slip on the edges. That was inspired by one of the pieces I had seen on the drying shelf.

I had a little more time spared on the clock so I decided to experiment a little more with the slip. I dropped a blob and using a stick, drag it a little into a fishie!

That wraps up the weekly lesson. Upcoming will soon be the final class to level one – glazing and firing.

#ceramic #ceramicart #ceramicpottery #claystories #clayart #claypottery #ceramicclay #designdotmuses #clayexpression #clayexpression_my #handbuilding #handmade #handbuildingpottery #handbuildingceramic #handmadewithlove #handmadeclay #pottersdiary #pottery #potter #potterylovers #potterymalaysia

So moving forward from Lesson 1, I was now introduced to making my own clay glue which is called a slip. A gluey substance that allows you to glue your pieces together. In a way, it is similar to cement for clay.

So another creation was made a forest themed vase. But this was only the beginning that inspired my personal project. A ceramic clock tower with pendulum.

Onwards, a new technique will be introduced and I will also get a chance to see my already fired and read to clay pottery.

Till next time~

#clay #wheremagicishandmade #ceramic #claystories #handmakingskills #ceramicclay #homemadestudio #clayworks

Yes tis’ be true! One of the many traditional skills I’ve wanted to master above all is the art of pottery. And no, this has nothing to do with the classic wheel throwing scene from Ghost with Patrick Swayze and Demi Moore.

So after months of searching around, I finally found a quaint little place hidden in the heart of USJ called Clay Expression to start this new journey of mine. Unfortunately, in all my gung-ho-ness, I have forgotten to document my very beginning and was left with the first creation!

So getting into business, Class 1 was more of an introduction to tools and workspace. Personally, there is a sense of serenity that is so perfect and sets you in the mood of working. My teacher was this young soul named Chloe. She was so soft-spoken to my usually noisy self. At this point, I remembered my random encounter with a Priest who looked me straight in the eye and told me that I need to learn to spend time in quietness. This made me realise that I was in the right place to start my new journey in life.

For starters, Chloe gave me a short tour of the studio. Her tour opened my mind into the various stages and labour that is needed for creating something purely by hand. Just to let you know, I had opted for the hand-building technique which mainly focuses on building pottery. This is very unlike to the traditional wheel-throwing technique. Nevertheless, once the orientation was over, she guided me to where the clay was stored and brought me to my designated working space. The next step, was to knead the clay. Now the term knead is only used for baking dough, the correct term for clay is wedge. This was the first part of labour. The act of wedging the clay is to release the air bubbles within the clay. Caution! Failure to wedge your clay may result in your formed pottery to explode when firing in the kiln.

Moving forward, I was taught on how to hand-build a bowl using a mould. Also I learnt how to create simple swirls, stamp patterns and random shapes using cookie cutters. All these pieces are build and attached as we go to avoid the clay drying up. To get the pieces to merge, the technique called blending is taught. We use the tip of the finger or the nail to gently merge the pieces to form the bowl. After three hours, I finally did it!

More adventure to follow suit as I journey with the rest of my classes!

#pottery #clayexpression_my #claymaking #apottersdiary