Thinking Upside Down

 These are new little plates and dishes that I designed last week. I have this wonderful Dover Coloring Book of traditional Japanese designs. I like looking through it and pulling out different elements from the drawings and rearranging them for pieces made in clay. Sometimes I make stamps, sometimes I create texture plates. This one was a little different because I wanted raised flowers. Hence the thinking upside down.

 I made a texture plate that I use to get the design onto a slab of clay that is then formed into a plate or dish. So the whole thing gets carved into a slab of clay. But while I'm doing this I have to think upside down. The parts that are carved in become raised in the final design and everything on the left becomes right when I pull the slab of clay off the pattern. It's a little tedious and I never know just exactly how it will turn out.

My thoughts go something like this. Will those flowers be too high? Too low? Will the leaves look like they are behind the flowers in the background. How will I glaze this? Is this a waste of time? Why am I designing new plates right now when I have a mountain of work to do? What shall we have for dinner? It's really quite a meditative process to go through. Full of deep thought and revelation.

 I am particularly pleased with how the glaze came out on this. It was a pleasant surprise because I used some glazes that look down right ugly on my porcelain. These plates are made out of stoneware and the darker clay muted the colours into nice earthy blends. I'm already thinking about pulling some of the pieces of this design into a series of pendants and beads. I think I might just bend my self imposed porcelain rule and make them out of stoneware. A leap for me. I like my porcelain. I like my routine. This is a little like living on the edge. Only without the risk.

Alice insisted that I show you a photo of her thinking upside down. She spends quite a lot of time in this position. But just between you and me, Alice isn't really thinking. She's not a very bright dog and doesn't spend a lot of time thinking. She gets by in life completely on her looks and sweet disposition.