Hand-painted Functional Art

Over the next few weeks, I'll be gradually listing more goodies in the shop. But I thought in the meantime, I'd show some of the ceramic pieces I've painted lately. Generally speaking, and I really wish this sounded more modest, I'm pretty good at painting. I love both oils and acrylics, but recently, due to my job, I've found a new fascination with ceramic glazes. They're so much more challenging than any other paints I've used, due largely to the fact that they change so drastically when they go through the kiln. It's always quite a surprise.

This first piece is my lil' baby. I worked on it for a whole month and it's the first in a series of pie plates I'm doing that depict juxtopositions with the sweet pies they'll one day contain. This has a serene sky on the outside and a flock of dead blackbirds within.

The cool thing about pie plates is that you can do some crazy stuff to them, since the artwork is getting covered up and then gradually becomes visible. I just love that.

This next piece is an octopus sushi platter. I never eat this much sushi, but I love the long shape of the piece and thought it'd be fun to do something dramatic. A little hard to tell, but the octopus is actually a dark chocolate brown.

I'll post more images a little later. It seems Blogger is having issues with my file sizes (what can I say? I like large picture files).

Oceanic Gift Tags, Ahoy!

Okay. I did it. Hand-drawn gift tags with tons of oceanic flair are now up for grabs in the ol' shop. I just love making fun little ephemeral stuff like this, so I thought, what the hell? I know when I give gifts this year I'll be attaching little hand-drawn gift tags just like these because they just make a package so much more cooler. I mean, c'mon. A squid? An octopus? AND a sting ray?! What's not to love about that?

This actually brings me to another point I've been thinking about lately. Christmas gifts. That's right, the big "C" word. Am I uttering it a little too soon? I'm thinking about giving everyone I know some hand-painted pottery done by yours truly, since I get a massive discount at my ceramic studio job. I've done some amazing pieces in the last month that I'm incredibly proud of--I may just have to whip out the digi cam and snap a few photos to throw on the blog. For some odd reason, I'm on a massive squid/octopus and bird kick. I can't paint me enough birds and cephalopods!

Hmmm...Gift Tags?

The holidays are coming up and I'm scrambling to get more pieces put together for the shop. I'm also beginning to cap off my custom request list so I can focus on some newer designs. Probably next month I'll put a hold to all customs and tell everyone to wait until January for any custom work. It just gets way to exhausting.

I'm also throwing around the idea for some paper-related things to go in my shop for the holiday season--you know, for a little added variety and exposure. My pieces are all polymer clay jewelry and accessories, but I do a ton of painting and drawing in my freetime as well (I mean, hell, I'm the friggin' Art Director for a ceramic studio--I'm around paint all day long), so I thought it may be fun to offer up some hand-drawn gift tags for the holidays and such. That way, people can purchase my jewlery (which already comes in killer hand-painted boxes, by the way...) and attach some cute little gift tags to go with them for presents. Cuz, a pretty little box without a hand-drawn squid gift tag is no gift at all. End of story.

Okay, back to work I go.

A 70s Kickback

Duuuude....They're, like, lava lamps or something.

Why, yes. Yes, they are. But they're also earrings, and that's way cooler.

Check these bad boys out. I sculpted mini versions of those awesome glowing lamps you'd sit and stare at for hours in your parents' basement while being stoned out of your bloody mind. The "lava" in these lamps is stationary, but still has that fluid look like the originals we all love. I also added the magenta freshwater pearl drops below to make 'em more fun and dangly. As if wearing lava lamps from your ears wasn't fun enough.

Yes! They are still available and are just $14 in the store.

Spooktacular!

Now that I'm pretty much all caught up on custom orders, I can focus on stocking up my depleted store. The holidays are approaching quickly, and I know I'll get hammered if I don't get some more items listed soon.

Every year I switch gears into Halloween-mode way too early. Usually happens in July, but this year it's a little later in August, and now I'm in full-swing Halloween frenzy. My sketchbook pages are filled with Halloween ideas and doodles. It's by far one of my most favorite holidays.

Be on the lookout for some cool Halloween-inspired pieces in the shop soon. I have a bunch of realistic pumpkin charms that I'm beginning to list (and at only $4 a pop, you can't go wrong) and they're so adorable! Lopsided and dirty, just like the reject pumpkins nobody wants.