musical robots

Lesson 1. when it comes to doing commission work: get paid up front. At least a portion of the price. Like a fool I jumped at the opportunity when a web dealer selling art for kids asked me to design some work for them. I would get paid a certain amount per print sold. Awesome! Except that after I had drawn all the designs, they backed out, saying they were under new direction and now selling work only by artists who have gallery representation. Lame.

But anyway, here are the music-themed robots they requested. I'll make prints of them myself eventually.


I did actually get paid to do this drummerbot, but thought it fit in with the theme and should be included.

more plates

Here are some more plates I made. Tom drew the fox and the cat, I drew the planes. These are small, sandwich size, but I'd like to make bigger ones.

As far as using pots as canvas goes, plates are ideal since they are flat, but then the question of usability comes into play- would you want to eat off a plate with a cat on it? Where do you place the food? How do the colors correlate with most food colors? Should they just be decoration? These are all things I need to experiment with.


And, for the technical details: Cone 10 Stoneware, clear and white glaze, black stain, and orange underglazes.

Sad Clown

Here's one of my favorite New Yorker cartoons. It was on my fridge, and I wanted to post it in case it gets lost during my move.

Read in style

If you find your book accessory assortment lacking, head on over to etsy to spice it up with handmade bookmarks, covers, bookends or vintage reading lamps. Typically I use gum wrappers, receipts or plane tickets to mark my page, but I was given an adorable robot bookmark as a gift, which I have been diligent about not losing.

Since I tend to have several books in progress at once, I decided to get another bookmark and found this dino marker for only a buck!

And on my "Favorites" page, I've had these bookends saved for a while. Nonchalant cowboys love holding up books! Also by the same artist: t-rex, "fancy horses," cats and sewing machine bookends.

Minnesota tees

MFM Apparel is a t-shirt company started by some cool peeps I know, Saman and Erica. Saman designed a threadless tee, which instantly gives him all sorts of art cred. On top of that, he makes cool designs related to Minneapolis and Minnesota- so if you want to represent, check out their website or etsy store. I've got the blue one above and would happily be twinsies. Oh yeah, and they'll be at Uptown Market this year, so look for 'em there!

quilt madness

I'm in Paducah, KY, during Quilt Week, where some 35-40,000 quilters invade the town. I'm with my mom, debuting her newest book, Nickel Quilts and Borders. She is also doing a series of benefit lectures for Habitat for Humanity, which is pretty cool. The vendors market is new, and needs help getting publicity, so spread the word about Two Hearts Quilt Market. It's in the old Gore's grocery store, which is a little bit out of the way, but completely worth the stop! We plan on coming back next year.

Here is a pic of the new book. I did the graphics. Tell your quilting relatives about it.
Nickel Quilts & Borders by Pat Speth

And! The Best In Show award went to a quilt based on Lord of the Rings.
Tribute to Tolkien by Sue McCarty

plates and drawings

I've been working with surface textures treatments lately, specifically with various methods of applying stain. Typically stain is applied after a piece has been fired once, bisqued, but with these plates I added stain while they were still greenware. First coating them in wax, then carving away the wax where I wanted the stain to be, I was able to use the clay as a canvas. I was a little nervous about messing up the drawings, so I had Tom draw some as well.



Glazing the plates I also used a completely new-to-me method: coating areas in liquid latex. Layering glazes can be tricky, especially if you want a crisp line, around a drawn image for example, and liquid latex can be applied with a brush and peeled off after you dip the piece in glaze. It was messy, smelly, and I ruined a couple of brushes, but I like the way the plates turned out and will probably use the latex some more.