I have a very long wish list, but also a very prioritized “not right now” list. As the reality of this nature-imposed break starts to set in, I am accepting that I can do some things that don’t have immediate benefit. Fortunately my problem-solving brain thinks of ways to make the work benefit long-run, but even so... Here’s what I am dabbling with right now:
I have wanted to do slip casting for a long time. Slip casting is when you pour liquid clay into molds rather than throw on the wheel or hand build. All of our commercial dishes are made this way, as it lends itself well to mass production. I have no interest in mass production, but I do like layers of colors! You can carve through these layers to get all kinds of beautiful effects.
So the big deal is this: First I have to make ideal forms to cast. (I don’t want to use commercial molds). Then, I have to make good plaster molds of whatever it is. (I’m starting with simple one-part molds for now, but eventually want to do complicated two or three part molds). THEN I need to make liquid casting slip, for which I just ordered some chemical thingy (deflocculant). And then figure out the slip-pouring, drying, and the rest of it… Experimenting with all of this leads to failed attempts and lots of seemingly wasted time. For example, my plaster had gotten too old and my first pour was ruined, and I wasted an entire day’s work. And made a huge mess.
Anyway, tiles are simple but annoying to make individually and we need a million of them for our continuing community tile project, including blank ones again for community to come in and paint, so I thought this would be a good place to start.
Today the (second set of) molds are poured and drying, the deflocculant is ordered, I have buckets of slip (all the time) waiting.
A small home project worthy version.
For my students: We did simple hump molds the other session, so you know how to mix plaster. Now if you want to make a slump mold of a solid model, you can just do it like the pictures below: Make a clay thingy OR glue some other kind of thingy to a plastic surface, (Just make sure it will be able to come out of the plaster, i.e., it can’t have parts surrounded by plaster). Coat everything with Murphy’s oil soap (three coats). Make a little berm around your thingy, with some extra head space. Pour your plaster in and let it set up.
You don’t need to use liquid slip in the molds: You can simply squish clay into the mold and pull it back out. (The cockroach on the mug in the front window is made with a little mold and then scored and slipped onto the mug body).
A super simple way to make any size form.
Ready to mix plaster
This is the fourth or fifth one so the workspace is getting messy…
Looks good! I’ll clean the edges with some sandpaper later. I’ll also dump or wash out the clay tile models later depending on how easily they release. (First time doing tiles so I have no idea).