Week 11 was the beginning of the end…
As part of my residency obligations, I gave an artist talk and hands-on workshop at the Yingge Ceramics Museum for the community this week. I had nearly 30 participants come for the all day event. The hands-on workshop challenged them to work in multiples and create 100 simple shapes based on their interests in nature. They then had to experiment with intriguing compositions of all their shapes. They were apprehensive at first but ultimately they really got into the idea and appreciated the process of playing with their clay, valuing process over product.
I gave two more hands-on workshops at the National Museum of Natural Science in Taichung this week too. Since the museum kindly took the time to share a behind-the-scenes experience with me a few weeks prior, I wanted to return the favor sharing a clay experience with them. The participants were staff and volunteers, most of whom had never played with clay, but who love science and nature. They even brought some bits from nature with them to use as inspiration. We created small bowls that they carved into to create natural patterns and designs. All of the bowls will be fired and glazed at the ceramics museum and then assembled to create a group installation that will be displayed at the science museum. The results celebrate the collaboration of ART + SCIENCE.
In other studio news, I’ve officially stopped building with wet clay in my studio now. I’m letting everything dry so it’s ready for a final firing. While clay pieces are drying and firing, I’m continuing to experiment with pouring resin. I’m learning a lot as I go and I’m very excited about this new path.
AND, as an added bonus this week, my husband Nate arrived! I’m so thrilled to see him after two and a half months apart! He’ll get to share the tail end of this experience with me and see some of Taiwan too. Hard to believe that I only have one more week here before we travel onward…