Networking
Throughout this project I made an effort to attend many networking events and opportunities.
The first event I extended was at Grit Studios, called 'Art + Work', This was a nice informal event where I had the pleasure to meet local artists and creatives, one of which was an artist called Alison Waters (below).
Alison Waters is a ceramic artist that focuses on slab building and "encouraging others to look closer and longer at the beauty around them whether natural or urban". I really like Waters work as I feel it shows narrative and beauty in urban landscapes that wouldn't normally be focused on. I also had the pleasure to see and chat to her again at the Great Northern Contemporary Craft Fair which was nice as I felt this was a good introduction to building my creative network.
At this Grit studios event I also attended a talk by the illustrator and artist Barney Ibbotson. (below)
This talk was very interesting and I found myself quite inspired by it. He talked about work he had done in the past as well as work that he was currently working on. He also talked about how he came to work in the style that he does and his own inspirations as an artist. I always find it interesting to hear illustrators talk about how they found their style, I think a lot of it comes from childhood inspiration and working to develop your style through work and practice from there, I find it inspiring to hear illustrators and artists older than me speak about their own development of work because I think it helps to put me in the headspace that my best work is yet to come and that everything that I'm doing now is just the next step to getting me there. I really like Barney Abbots work as I find the way he uses colour interesting and effective and his composition the perfect crossroads between modern and elaborate maximalism.
Another similar artist that I got the opportunity to meet at a Grit studios event was the artist Stanley Chow. (below)
Although my chat with Stanley was quite brief I felt accomplished that I had gotten a minuet to talk to him through everyone else in the room. I have been aware of Chows work for a long time and have always be in awe of how much likeness he can capture with what seems like such basic shapes. I think in my work with 3D modelling I can take some observations from this and incorporate this in future.
Other than Grit Studios I also have been able to network through my new job
In summer I took on a job with the company Paintvine. Paintvine run events called 'Paint and Sip' and 'Sculpt and Sip', where people book into our events and come along to have drinks with their friends whilst being taught how to paint or how to sculpt with clay. I have had the pleasure to have been teaching the sculpt and sip sessions regularly every Sunday, mostly on my own but sometimes I will get to work with an assistant when I have larger groups. I really love working with assistants as I get to meet many other local creatives and makers of a similar age from many different disciplines. I've also been having an amazing time learning and developing my own teaching style and teaching what I love. I also get to meet a wide range of interesting people when I get to teach corporate events. (class set up below).
One day on my way home from work I passed by AltogetherOtherwise where I found Joe Hartley packing up for the day. he invited me in and we got to chatting. it was really lovely to re connect with Joe again after he had been a guest tutor at the start of last year and had taught me a lot of the skills I use now in ceramics. Whilst we were chatting I mentioned that I was now doing a little bit of teaching myself now and he mentioned that he was looking for some ideas of new things to teach at classes at AltogetherOtherwise and asked if I could come in and help with some teaching, that would be a great help. we are still in talks about what we could do however we are making tracks into developing some ideas that we can make happen in future.
However I have been doing some markets to sell some of my smaller more commercial items, one of which markets was at Altogether otherwise (below).
I have a long history of selling at art markets, mostly with my friend and local sustainable artist and maker Maisey Wilson (Mazalou Designs). I think markets have really grown my confidence with selling my work as well as giving me an opportunity to put my pricing and marketing research into practice. I also find these markets to be amazing networking events as I have had the opportunity to meet countless amazing other makers and sellers and I think I have built quite a nice creative network through them. I also get to practice my application skills as for each market I have to write an application proposal to see if we will get picked for a table. (our most recent application below).
In the past few months I have done markets at Victoria Baths, Salford Quays, AltogetherOtherwise and most recently at Islington Mill (islington mill market below).
This market turned out to be an absolutely fantastic opportunity for me. I got to network with a lot of different sellers. Recently I have been thinking realistically about what the future of my practice looks like and how I can carry on my practice without the use of uni workshops. I thought that this would be a good place to look around and chat to some people as most of the sellers were makers that worked in the studios here.
Our table was located in Unit 4 however I wanted to go and explore the rest of the mill, whilst exploring the mill I ran into the Engine House Collective, this was a collective of makers in the main mill building who were holding a gallery show. I had noticed a section of ceramics in one corner and then recognised a lady that had come by our stall earlier in the day who had been very complimentary about my ceramics, I got talking to her about the ceramics at this exhibition and she told me that they were hers! Her name was Anita and has a business called Luna Luna Ceramics (below).
I got talking to her about her studio and where she is currently based, she told me that she had just recently moved out of the mill and has just moved into Yellow Hammer studios in Stockport. I took her details and we are currently organising for me to come and visit her studio to come and look round.
i have plans to also go to Stockport to see the photographer Fiona Finchett who I had also met at Grit Studios whilst I was visiting there. We have organised to go and visit some of her friends at different studios around there.
Whilst at the Islington Mill Market, back in Unit 4 where we were selling, I met the ceramicist Dave Partington who was selling a few tables down (below).
we chatted about studios and community kilns and our individual practices and we found out that we had quite a few mutuals in common, I also told him about how I was getting teaching experience through my job which is when he mentioned 'Fired up 4', Fired up 4 clay is an organisation that works with studios in youth zones to try and get clay into the hands of young people as they believe that creative outlets can provide an almost therapeutic experience for young people. Dave told me that there would defiantly be an opportunity through this for me to get involved and to keep in touch. I have been keeping in touch and am trying to work something out for after Christmas as I think this will be a really interesting opportunity for me.
Once It was time to pack up and leave Rebecca from the mill came to collect our stall fees, I chatted to her about studio spaces and she asked me when I would be looking for one. We exchanged emails and she said she would send me some information and let me know when they're likely to have openings, which is a fantastic help.
Talks
The first talk I went to was one with the curator and alumni Lillie Tew. I found her talk quite inspiring as she said that even though she wasn't completely sure what she was doing for her degree show, she still found opportunity and managed to succeed onto a masters and found her passion. I was also very interested in her placement that she did in Scandinavia and think I would really like to do something similar myself. (notes from talk below)
After the talk I had a tutorial with her and Amandine Ndoye. Amandine and I have been talking for a while about holding our own exhibition featuring our own work as well as the work of other ceramicists from our corse. As Lillie has experience with gallery curation we asked her many questions and for advice on how we should go about doing this. She gave us lots of good points and encouraged us to go ahead and make it happen. Ami and I will be organising this exhibition after Christmas for February.
Another alumni talk I went to was a showcase of many recent graduates who all told us what they had been up to since graduating. I found this talk extremely useful and quite inspiring as I feel it gave me a very realistic insight into what my life might look like in the next few coming years. I really liked seeing the vast range of industries that people had gone into and some of the opportunities that came their way and how they navigated these. (notes from talk below).
Collaboration
Bartoz Soroka came to me with a proposal of going into collaboration with each other into creating an illustrated metal vessel. He would make the vessel and complete the metal processes if I provided the illustration from a brief of his choosing and apply it to the pot. I was excited to take on this brief as I have only ever briefly worked with metal and was excited about the idea of having my illustration on a metal object as my drawings mostly only ever find themselves on the surface of ceramic items.
Bart gave me the brief of a dragon with three angels and smoke. When I asked the story of this collaboration Bart sent me this explanation.
"This project is about storytelling through vessels/objects, this object having a story explicitly stated on it. It’s an ancient vessel depicting a myth, akin to pots and ceramics from Ancient Greece."
"The story is of a dragon that spanned the whole forest, the trees whispered to him and filled his ears with haze, his eyes losing light, his body mind and souls out-crippling one another. When angels were sent to guide, his broken pupils mistook their halos for horns. The vile creature doused all in thick, heavy smoke and when the ash settled his exile began".
I loved this story so was very excited to be involved in bringing it to life. We had a few discussions abut the style that he wanted. He wanted a Japanese inspired dragon with smoke around it in a correlating Japanese style. I found this brief a little bit daunting at first as this was defiantly not anything that I had experience with drawing before and how this would fare in a composition with angels was an even further wonder, however I decided that the only way to figure it out would be to do an initial drawing and edit it to his vision. (initial drawing below). 
As my first ever drawing of a dragon I thought that this was quite successful form wise. I took this drawing to Bart and we marked it up with any changes he wanted to make so that I could complete a new more finalised drawing that fit his vision more. (marked up drawing below).
In the mark up we decided to make the arch in the back of the dragon a bit more dramatic, the head a lot more simplified, the legs and wings a lot smaller, and we decided to make the dragon in silhouette to make it easier when it came to transferring it onto the vessel.
We also decided that as we were taking inspiration from ancient vessels that making the overall style a bit more historically influenced would add interest to the piece. we decided that the angels would take their form from a more ancient cave painting style.
I did some historical reference research to inspire me further.
(Dragon below). I looked at ancient Japanese dragon paintings. obviously a lot of the reference taken from these will have to be simplified quite significantly.
(Angels below). I have looked at traditional cave painting imagery swell as aboriginal art from Australia as I think the style of these paintings will lend themselves nicely to the imagery of angel figures due to their halo like style of heads.
(Smoke below). I have looked at ancient Chinese stylised clouds called 'auspicious clouds' as I liked the decorative style of these and think I could make these look like billowing smoke and the style would fit nicely around the form.
I started off with drawing my dragon by taking notes on the forms and repeated shapes from my reference drawings so that I could understand the anatomy of these styles of dragons a bit more. (below).
I then drew up a dragon on photoshop (below) that would fit the shape of the final vessel. I knew it had to fly around the vessel so it couldn't be too wiggly like the historical dragon drawings. I also had to stick to the feedback that Bart and I had drawn up on the original drawing concept.
I think I did really well with this dragon drawing and stuck to parts feedback as well as the historical reference. I am very proud of this drawing and Bart absolutely loved it when I showed him so it was time to move onto the other elements, the angels and smoke. I just sketched these out onto of the dragon drawings so I could make sure these were cohesive with the dragon.
I thought all of the references were clear and what Bart had asked for so I was ready to show him all three elements together. I knew that the composition would potentially have to change but I knew this would have to be worked out when I had my hands on the actual vessel itself so I could see what I was working with.
Once Bart had completed the vessel, he brought it over to my flat so we could mark it up and agree on a composition. (below). He drew on the vessel with pencil and marked up the size and areas where he wanted each image to be.
I measured out each section on the vessel and resized and traced my drawings to fit. (below).
I then covered the back of these tracings with charcoal and taped them to the vessel in their correct areas. (below).
once my drawings were taped to the vessel I could then re trace over these with a sharp point pen, applying hard pressure to make sure the graphite on the other side of the drawings would transfer effectively onto the metal surface underneath. (below).
Once I had done this I could then go over this with a special pen that Bart had given me that draws and stays on a metal surface. (below).
This was a very nerve-racking process as if I made a mistake whilst using this pen, I wouldn't be able to remove it and I didn't want to mess up Barts hard work and craftsmanship.
Despite this fear, I decided to freehand the smoke to fit around the remainder of the vessel as I thought that this was the only way to make sure that all of the elements would be truly be cohesive and flush together. once I had completed this step, my illustration on the vessel was finished. (below).
Bart then came to pick up the vessel the next morning to carry out the next process which was called acid etching, which raised the drawing from before to create a textured surface where my drawing had been.
I then picked it up from him again and had to go over the etching with the metal pen again so it was ready for the next process. (acid etching below).
a little bit more difficult this time to draw on the pot accurately as the etching had given the surface an un even texture but it completed this step to the best of my ability. Bart then picked up the piece from me for a final time and carried out the final process where he put it in a liver of sulphur and lightly sanded it. The piece was now complete.
(final piece below).
I think I really learnt a lot through this collaboration project. I learnt how to collaborate with a client figure and design an illustration to an external brief. I think I pushed my drawing style out of my comfort zone and I also got to learn more about the different steps that go into producing a metal piece like this. I'm really happy with how this turned out and I am excited to take on more collaborative briefs in the future.