hybrid--> a thing made by combining two different elements; a mixture. A mixed character; composed of mixed parts.
transformation--> a thorough or dramatic change in form or appearance.
duality--> an instance of opposition or contrast between two concepts or two aspects of something.
hierarchy--> the order in which the human eye perceives what it sees. A system or organization in which people or groups are ranked one above the other according to status or authority.
Sketches
For this project, I immediately went with the first idea I had to represent transformation: hands into a bird. I liked the context and relativity of these two things, having the crossed hands seemingly making the shape of a bird (like with shadow puppets) into the actual thing it is trying to represent. I just didn't know for sure how I would convey the intermediate between the two, and whether or not to have the clay pieces "flapping their wings" during the transformation.
Final Pieces
I had not had a whole lot of experience with clay prior to this project, but after getting into it, I think I began to get the hang of it. I was a little concerned about how well I would be able to render the hands specifically, but my instructor helped get me started--first molding the general shape of the hands, then refining down--and it turned out to be not as difficult as I had anticipated.
Once I had the hands formed, the other two pieces came more naturally. I always tended to start out with same general shape for each piece, keeping a general continuity between the three pieces. However, I changed the position of the wings/fingers to make it appear as if the "bird" was flapping its wings in flight, even though the figures themselves have their backsides laying flat on the table. I felt like this mimic of moment would be more dynamic in the transformation. As the transition from hands to bird ensues, more detail is added. I used the tip of a pencil (mostly) to add the lines and indentions in the three clay figures. The intermediate piece between the hands and the bird is a hybrid of the two; I webbed the fingers together to make to uniformed wholes and blended the thumbs to gather and brought the tip of the top thumb to more of a point (lending itself as a beak).
Overall, I did enjoy this project. I was surprised actually at how fast I was able to get it done because I was concerned in the beginning whether or not I would have enough time to accurately execute my idea. I am pretty pleased with my three pieces. There are some things I wish I had been more elaborate with, like with the nails on the hands, or maybe more detail in the bird, but I was not completely confident in my skill with clay to pull these off without taking away form the pieces. I do believe I have a generally fluid and obvious transition between my three models, while connecting the two different objects in a witty and thoughtful way. I was excited to connect these two things on a physical and psychological level. I hope that it is visually interesting. I feel like the pieces are strongest when together; I do not feel like they would be as dynamic if they were displayed individually, separate from each other. I probably could have smoothed out some of the rougher edges a bit more, and added a bit more detail. However, I do think my craft was okay overall. Hopefully the pieces don't crack after they are fired in the kiln!
........
Well, two of my three clay pieces kind of exploded in the kiln. Luckily, I was able to glue most of the pieces back tougher with Liquid Nails. Once they were all glued together, I think glazed them with a layer of saddle soap and brown shoe polish. These were the final results of my ceramics pieces.
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