SI #6

5 ½” tall, 2 ½” diameter

Essential/Overall Inquiry: Exploring relationships of flowers to personal experiences/connections. Exploring shifting my knowledge of the maiolica glaze style to a style more personal to me.

Ideas: Exploring showing tulip shape on a thrown form. Exploring showing connection to mental health.

Materials: Stoneware clay

Processes: Throwing, light carving to sketch and emphasize, staining and glazing

Reflection

I chose the yellow tulip because of my connection to the Yellow Tulip Project through a suicide awareness fundraiser. It is a symbol of hope and perseverance in mental health for me. I wanted to show the connection to the feeling of hope, so I included the roots and bulb of the flower in my design. I also wanted to be consistent with my investigation of the maiolica style and blend it with my own. I used light pastel colors and patterns throughout the piece to connect to that style. I wanted to look into the shape of a tulip in my form, and ended up with a tall, skinny form like the flower is as a whole, but I did not show the bulb-shape of the flower because I did not like that idea aesthetically. I stained the flower a darker brown at the roots and lightened the colors as they rose up the vase to show that the hope to persevere through hard situations is rooted in the dark, hard times and eventually blossoms/glows when things feel better. 

I originally had a different design but switched to a different form because I felt unsatisfied and unchallenged by my original piece. It also felt unconnected to my idea of exploring the shape of the flower on my form. I experimented with sketching my design on the clay using a ball-tip tool and I found that it was easily ‘eraseable’ and easy to trace. When I was glazing, I had to think about how to get the effect of colors lightening up the vase and how to emphasize the tulip flower itself. I did so by just using 3 colors that were placed from dark to light and by making the tulip bright.

Moving forward, I want this piece to remind me to challenge myself when I feel unsatisfied with my work. It helped me with my building by revising and experimenting with how I made the leaves for the ivy and the cherry blossoms. I re-did and rethought until I was happy with their shape and stability.