What's Happening?
News and Announcements
The Clinton Arts Center will be closing its studio for the summer.
We thank you all for the support and look forward to a robust Fall schedule.
Stay tuned to our website, we will keep you posted on our
progress as we continue to develop our program, design the new location,
and conduct field trips to other arts organizations so that we may bring you
the very best!
This Michigan highschool art show will be available to see for two more weeks.
The exhibit then makes its way to Grand Rapids.
Gallery hours: Fridays: 1-5 pm, and Saturdays 10:30-5:00 pm
Visit the CAC Gallery on Saturday from 10:30-4:00 p.m. to see
current CAC instructor work for sale.
Margaret Miller Ceramics Opening
December 11, 2015
6 pm-8pm
Join us at the Clinton Farm Market for a Ceramics Raku firing.
Glaze a pot and watch it get fired!
The Clinton Farm Market is every Friday, from now through October 2015.
Market hours are 3:00 pm to 6:00 PM.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=dv3SR7wLeoo
Friday, July 17, 2015
Today was very busy. I pulled my flower pot of cane. Put together a plate using the cane for fusing. I built the murrine tray and got it ready for fusing. Then put in an expiermental disign using the murrine chips left over from when I cut the murrine 3/8" pieces. And put together a flower pot of cane to pull on Saturday. The three pieces are in the kiln fusing Friday night. They will be ready to see and cold work on Saturday.
Here are the cut cane ready to go into the kiln for fusing.
Drawing a shape on the kiln shelf allows for placing the murrine inside of lines to create a non-square shape.
After the murrine are place, they can be surrounded by fiber paper and supported by small blocks of kiln shelf. Any shapes can be made with this method.
Lning up all the little round Murrine can be tedious. Sorting them to make designs is also tedious. There are many hundred murrine in a small piece. To me the pieces are beautiful.
I did not take as many pictures as I should have. Was to busy getting my pieces ready for the kiln. I promise more pictrues tommorrow.
Thursday, July 16, 2015
Today we went for a field trip to one of the many beautiful National Parks around Santa Fe. The rock formations and vegitation made it impossible to take a bad picture.
The opportunity for a bit of wild life photography presented itself.
Upon returning to Bullseye, we began to pull murrine. By stacking the pot in different colors, a gradation of color is possible. Creating a top disk top disk for the flower pot allows for a specific pattern in the center part of the murrine. After pulling my flower pot of murrien,
I spent the rest of the day chopping it into little pieces about 3/8" long. I managed to get 2 blisters.
The inside of the flower pot can be very beautiful. They are however, very fragile. The pot often shatters.
Wednesday, July 15
This morning we visited the behind the scenes tour of Native American baskets and pottery of the Santa Fe area. The Museum's collection was beautiful. Unfortunately, pictuers were not allowed. The sculpture in front of the building was available for photographs.
We returned to Bullseye Resource Center to prepare flower pots full of glass to create murrine and cane.
A series of circles are cut to fill the flower pot to create the Murrine. Each circle is 1/16" larger than the previous. Cutting circles is very easy with the right tools.
The first 10 or so circles are clear. This allows for glass to begin with for pulling. The first bit of glass in the bottom of the flower pot is a bit cooler and it takes about 12" or so of cane or murrine to get to the glass temperature even for pulling.
30 circles filled my flower pot. Each color change represents a ring in the murrine.
The round slab 1" thick will crown the flower pot and create the center of the Murrine.
The cut circles are placed in the flower pot and the circular slab crowns it. The hole in the bottom of the flowerpot is enlarged to 1" to allow for the glass to funnel out for the pull.
The final stack of glass ready for the kiln.
Not bad for the amout of glass cutting I did.
Tomorrow the pull!
Tuesday, July 14
Learning to make and pull glass cane and Murrine is a hot job. This week Ruth is learning the basics of this from Nathan Sandberg.
First step is to stack glass into a flower pot, yes a terra cota flower pot, not from Mexico. The ones from Mexico melt a to low a temperature and will make a mess in the kiln. Place the flower pot full of glass in a kiln and heat it up to about 1505°F. Once the flower pot full of molton glass, the glass can be pulled through hole in the bottom of both the flower pot and the kiln. As the glass starts to ooze out of the kiln attach a punti, or cold piece of glass to begin to pull the hot glass from the kiln.
Once the first bit of the glass is pulled from the kiln, the punti and glob of glass is cut off and discarded.
A pliers is then used to pull the cane from the kiln into long strips that are placed on wood slats to cool.
After the initial clear "waster" glass is pulled out the pattern stacked in the flowerpot begins to form the pattern in the cane. The cane can be twisted in either direction form interesting patterns.
The final cane can be broken into desired lengths and fused into larger pieces or as additions to pieces.
For some really great work using cane, murrine, and stringer check out these artists:
