What happens when you change your mind

I am really bad about changing directions midstream. I will have a color in mind, then part of the way through I will see something else in the horse. I think I must have developed this habit when I was still doing mixed media work, because it isn't really a problem there.

That cannot be said when working with underglaze. It's a medium with a lot of constraints, so each color requires a plan that works around them. Where will your handholds go? (Raw underglaze cannot be touched, and fired underglaze is only slightly better.) What might get overspray? (There is no removing it once it's on.) Which colors fade with multiple firings? (Those have to go last.) Mapping out a plan is a bit like piecing together a puzzle. Needless to say, rearranging your pieces after the plan is underway is a bad idea.

But the temptation to create a color you can suddenly see as "perfect" for the horse is really strong. Which is why the medallion above has all that purple SaranWrap on it. I originally planned to make him a true grey with dark points. That meant I could mask and spray his mane, then go back and do his neck dappling and face shading. It wouldn't change the mane color, because I wasn't going to hit the neck really hard, and any overspray was just more of the grey already used on the mane. The black already on the mane would overpower it.

But when he came out of the kiln with his first layer of grey dappling, I couldn't help but imagine him as a rose grey. What I saw was the kind of bay-going-grey that retains a lot of reds in the dappled areas, but has cooler grey tones on the lower face and mane. Unfortunately I had added a color to his glaze to make cleaning up the edges of his mane easier. But I wouldn't want the color to scratch off easily if I needed to mask it! And I would need to mask it if I wanted the mane and face to retain their cool color. I decided to cut pieces of the plastic wrap to fit the mane tendrils, and anchor them with latex masking (which is always slightly tacky to the touch) on the back and on strategic points on the mane. Those were the points were I thought I could convincingly handpaint detailing to obscure any marring. Oh, and my finger there was holding the piece in a way that masked that mane piece and the upper neck.

So far it did work. None of the mane got marred, and he's cooling in the kiln. But I'll need to pull it off at least one more time with another layer of dappling. I think he'll turn out really neat. Or he'll be a really good lesson on how I should put as much effort into the initial color selection as I do into color planning!

(Lisa, if you are reading this, yes, that is your show donation that I'm getting reckless with. I promise if I really hose him up, I'll make you a new one!)

The end of an era

As many of you have probably heard, Joan announced that she'll be closing Pour Horse Pottery. Otto, the Shetland pictured above, will be the company's last production run horse.

It's almost impossible to overstate the impact Joan has had on the model horse industry. She realized the dream so many of us had, that one day we would once again have fine earthenware horses in the tradition of Hagen-Renaker. Over the years she pushed the boundaries of both mold-making and glazing, releasing production pieces once thought impossible given the limitations of the medium.

Had that been all, it would have been an impressive achievement. But Joan has always been committed to sharing what she knew with others. Virtually all of us currently working in earthenware horses were taught by her. Whether it was glazing, or mold-making, or casting or setting up a studio, she gave information freely to anyone who asked. The rich, close-knit atmosphere of the model horse ceramic community owes a lot to the tone she set from the beginning.

I would not be doing what I am doing today without Joan. She's been my mentor for ten years now. She's also one of my closest and most treasured friends. I'm excited for her as she looks towards the future. She's told me that she wants to do more experimenting, more pushing of what we can do with our chosen medium. I am looking forward to seeing what she does.

Things that make me happy

I have been so pleased with the recently reorganized Realistic Equine Sculpture Society. I was particularly excited to learn that Sarah Minkiewicz-Breunig would be taking the helm editing the organization's biannual ezine The Boat. Those of you who know Sarah know that she never does anything in moderation.

Over the weekend I received my copy of the first issue. The first full-color, 195 page issue! Nope, no moderation there. The magazine goes out to members in PDF form, so what you see in the above picture is the printout that I made and set inside sheet protectors. I thought that might be a wise precaution given the likelihood of the articles ending up in the studio for reference. In that photo the book is opened to an article on planning - and revising - sculptures. That's just one of many really in-depth articles. The article on hooves alone is fifty pages long! (I suspect my little version of Sprinkles would like it if I quit reading about revisions and just roughed in her last leg, or perhaps a proper head!)

That would have been enough to keep me happily reading for the rest of the week, but then this morning I found this. That's the Dutch horse color book Het Paard in Zijn Kleurenrijkdom, written by J.K. Wiersema and published in 1977. Almost twenty years after it was published, I found a copy in the rare book room at the old Arabian Horse Trust and was able to leave with a rather poor black-and-white xerox of the contents. The original book, however, was in color and I've often wished I had access to it again now that color copies can be so easily had. So when I accidentally stumbled across this, I was beyond thrilled! I don't speak Dutch, unfortunately, so I still cannot read a word of it. But the rare photographs of appaloosa Welsh Ponies and silver dapple Groningers were what I was really after.

None of this is getting my dapple greys finished, of course. Tomorrow the books get put away and it's back to the painting table.

Temptations

It has been almost five years since I cold-painted a horse. For a while I did both - glazing ceramics and mixed media on resins. But over time the cold-painting tapered off as I got more deeply involved in ceramic production. Glazing is a good fit for me, and I've been an infinitely more productive artist since transitioning over to it.

But every now and again sculptures come out in resin that tempt me. These two guys - Lynn Fraley's Netsky and Sarah Rose's Mini Indy - have been sitting on my work bench doing just that. They represent two of my favorite breed types (small ponies and southern gaited horses). And I've learned that switching media from time to time can give you insights that keep your primary work fresh.

It's also tempting since our family's annual week on Pawley's Island is coming up soon. For all the wonderful things about ceramics, one big drawback is that works in progress are so not portable! These two little guys keep whispering to me, "Hey, prime us and you can tote us and the pencils along and work on the beach. Those bisques over there can't come to the beach." So far I've been holding them off by reminding that that it will most likely mean one of them comes home half-painted and ends up staying that way for the next few years! But it is tempting.

A day for dappling

"Glory be to God for dappled things" - Gerard Manley Hopkins

My husband found that Victorian-era quote a few years ago. I'm not sure Mr. Hopkins was thinking about horses when he wrote that line, but I certainly share his sentiment. Dappled horses - greys in particular - are among my favorites to paint. I started working on a group of them last week and will finally get to return to work on them today.



I paint my greys in stages, so they usually go through a half-dozen or so firings. This guy is really early in the process, having been through one firing (his mane, tail and legs) and just getting the coloring for what will be his second. You can just barely see the first layer of light grey on his forehand, which I have begun to erase. As I've mentioned before, when working with underglaze dappling is done by removal. You can see my main tools for this there in foreground - a stiff white EraserStik (sadly no longer made, so I'm always searching for them) and a softer pink Faber-Castell eraser pencil. The large, soft brush helps soften the edges of the dapples so the underglaze doesn't "pile" up and create a dark rim around the erased spot.

This first bit of dappling is always the hardest because the grey underglaze is much, much paler when it is raw than when it is fired. That makes it hard to see what you are doing. Usually I try to spray one light coat on the neck, forehand, and barrel, dapple those areas and fire again. Then when it comes out of the fire, that first coat can serve as the underpainting.



This guy is at that stage now. I can better see my dappled pattern, and I've added the first layer to his hindquarters. On an intensely dappled horse with a primarily dark hindquarter, I often leave that area until later so I don't risk marring it while handling the horse. Here I've also wrapped the finished areas, and the unworked areas, so they don't get hit with any overspray. Because the grey is so pale, it's easy to overspray without knowing it until after it fires and becomes obvious. I haven't wrapped those areas completely up to the new, though, because I don't want a line where the border was. (That's also why the wrap around his head is so loose - no hard edges in case I do spray in that area.)







This guy is one step further than the Andalusian above, with one more firing on his hindquarters. Unlike the others, though, his legs were left unfinished up until this point. His legs will remain relatively light, so they have not yet been sprayed at all. If the color calls for a dark leg, I usually paint those first so I have a good hand-hold. Most of the dark tones I use are pretty sturdy after they are fired, and even when they get rubbed they can be resprayed without any real harm. If I marred a light leg my only option would be to go darker. So his legs will stay light until closer to the end. Today, I'll start adding the red tones to his hindquarters, since he's to be a rose grey.

You'll notice that none of the faces on these guys are shaded at all. On greys I like to do that at the end so I can get a better feel for the finished look. That way I can adjust how light or how dark the face shading needs to be to balance out the piece.



And here you can see how my preference for dark leg hand-holds creates legions of only-the-legs-painted bodies on my workbench! All three of the horses on the left became, or will become greys (this is an older picture). The Arab at the top right is to be a dappled bay (hence the golden tones above her black legs) and the claybody below him will a loud bay leopard.

That's also why tobianos are the "easy" color in underglazed ceramics. Their white legs mean that they start out with safe handles. No rubs to worry about! They get finished in far fewer firings, too. But I still find the dappled horses hard to resist.

That tobiano "Arabian"

When I posted about this mare a little over a month ago, I said that I would pass along any further information.

The original seller (not linked) claimed that the mare was a "confirmed purebred", and it does appear that she was indeed registered. But since that time serious questions have been raised about her papers. It is a bit of a soap opera so I'll leave off the details, but discussions can be found here, here and here. (The sites linked may require registration.)

So for the moment there is a registered tobiano Arabian. She does not, however, appear to be a legitimate purebred. The registry is investigating, and most observers believe she'll lose her papers.

Note: Since this post was made, some of the linked discussions have been removed.

Pony Beads!

I meant to post this earlier, but here are a handful of the smallest versions of the Celtic Pony.



And here are some earrings made with the beads.