A post about Ceramic Stuff

I was going to title this post, “Shop Talk” or “Ceramic Chat” but they both sounded a bit wanky and contrived and so I have given this post a very literal title, as it truly is a blog post about ceramic stuff. Today I have written this post specifically to link up with, The Mud Colony Blog.

Melbourne based production potter, Adriana Christianson is the creator of the “Mud Colony” blog and each week Adriana hosts a ceramic link up, which is open each week  from Thursday through to Sunday. This link up is a great resource for all potters be they professional or hobbyists and you will find a wonderful community of friendly clayworkers.

Adriana is also the Admin of the Mud Colony group on Facebook and all potters/ceramists/ceramic artists are welcome to join the group.

So, now onto my contribution.

Not a whole lot of ceramics has been happening here in the frog ponds rock studio, I have been glued to the computer for most of this week creating a new website/blog for the Tasmanian Ceramics Association. I would like to ask you to please do me a favour and add the Tasmanian Ceramic Association to your blogrolls if you could please, as the links give google a bit of a jolt and we will then show up in search engines.

In September, The Tasmanian Ceramics Association held their annual General Meeting and somehow I found myself elected to the dual roles of President and Web Master. I use the title Web Master as it amuses me to think of myself with a top hat and a whip taming unruly links and the like.

One of my first roles as President of the TCA was to attend a meeting of various ceramic representatives in Adelaide at the recent Triennale, to determine the location of the 2015 and 2018 ceramic conferences. With the support of the TCA committee and the encouragement of good friends I said that Hobart would love to host the 2018 Triennale and our proposal was accepted.

I immediately sent off a text to a friend and he replied with, “Now is not the time to panic Kim” and I think that text might just become my newest mantra. So now as well as having the titles, President and Web Master, I also am the Chair of the 2018 Tasmanian Triennale Steering committee. It is a good thing that I spend a lot of my time elbow deep playing in the mud, otherwise I might start to get a bit cocky.

Speaking of playing in the mud, Prime Minister, Julia Gillard’s speech the other week had me fist pumping the air in joyful salute and my feminist blood was surging. Finally a high powered woman has stepped up and said to the world, we are not going to take this sexist shit anymore.

Thank you Prime Minister.Thank you very much.

In honour of our Prime Minister I asked a number of high profile women on twitter, women I admire for one reason or another, to give me a tweet that captured how they felt about our Prime Ministers speech. The women who have generously given me a tweet are Jane Caro,  Dr Leslie Cannold, Destroy the Joint,  Catherine Deveny, Kim Foale ,Veronica Foale, Dee Madigan,  Dr Jennifer Wilson,  Stella Young and one anonymous tweet which represents the voice of all women.

I am in the process of making ten bowls with the tweets inscribed inside them. Once the bowls are finished I will exhibit them at the Off Centre during the month of December and then I will take the bowls to Burnie with me as part of the Fired Up 2 exhibition.

This is one of the bowls in the raw, the photo is from my instagram account and the tweet is from Dr Leslie Cannold. Dr Cannold’s tweet says,

If only we’d known the world would find a woman blowing her top about misogyny so special, we’d have done it sooner. Nice work PM #Gillard

Here are some more of the bowls drying out, again the image was taken with my phone and posted to my instagram account.

The Tasmanian Ceramics Associations annual exhibition, “Forty Years in The Making” is currently showing at the Rosny Schoolhouse Gallery and runs until the 4th of November.The Gallery is open Tuesday to Friday 11.00am – 4.00pm Saturday and Sunday 12.00pm – 4.00pm.

This is the work that I have chosen to exhibit in the show.

and this one.

And that is all the ceramic news I have for you today. Apologies to everyone who has seen these photos before.

I strongly encourage any and all potters to find and join in with Adriana Chriastainson’s Mud Colony, it is a lot of fun.