jackalog

weird weekend. turns out our dog was pregnant, but now she’s not. and that’s what i did all day saturday.

sunday it was just wind. i hate extreme wind. and now i need to go pick up all of our recycling stuff from around the yard–and the neighbors’ yards–and kansas city and detroit.

the kiln replacement is supposed to arrive today. we’ll see . . .

i’ve been painting on canvas and finding it less than enjoyable. i just can’t get into it. not sure why. would much rather be china painting. but i’ll keep trying.

  rocking woman ann*ifact

–i re-strang this on friday–had originally used yellow and turquoise seed beads for the strings, but i didn’t like how it turned green by optical illusion.

during the wind yesterday, i spring-cleaned my computer: moved a whole bunch of stuff from the hard drive to cd’s. cleaned out all the myspace and facebook-or-whatever cookies gathered by visitors. as well as the internet cache and temp files, etc. it feels good to purge.

some family came to visit the kittens, and that was nice, though brief.

Louis and i had wine and watched the last episode of arrested development season two. and we laughed.

Louis is working on the royal louis ship, which is one of my favorites–very ornate, colorful, has sails, which are very aesthetically pleasing to me (as opposed to battleships, which are all gray and industrial-looking. except when they’re in “parade dress”, and then they are kinda pretty. but the royal louis is marvelous).

guess i’ll try more canvas-painting today while i wait for my kiln.

well, not so busy now–waiting . . . mostly for the kiln replacement. also for some cones to make sure the kiln is (when i get it and use it) heating correctly. can’t even make glass beads, because i need the kiln for annealing. –and that’s the main reason i felt i had to stay with the paragon caldera kiln rather than switch, in desperation: i have the “bead collar” for the caldera, which is extremely handy when i’m annealing glass beads. this collar wouldn’t fit any other kiln.

will try to talk myself into doing some acrylic-on-canvas paintings during this down time.

ordered some grid-walls for our booth, so we can hang the “ann*ifacts” on them. the ann*ifacts are available with shadow-boxes, if desired, so that they (’facts) can be used as home decor instead of or in addition to body decor. [syntax again. sheesh! p'raps i'm too mush-brained in my old age to write correctly!].

spent time with part of the extended family yesterday, and it was very nice. very good kids. very good mom & dad.

i think our cat, abby, may be allergic to purina dry food. or something: she has these “fits” that remind me of tourette’s syndrome in humans. she is apparently sneezing, but she does it repeatedly for about a minute at a time–ffft! ffft! ffft!–and her head jerks to one side, and she brings her paw up to her face (looks as though she’s slapping herself), and her nose begins to bleed profusely, and she ends up blowing out this huge blood-booger. [is it lunchtime yet?]. i’ve really no idea what’s up with this, but she seems to do it much less when i feed her canned food. in fact, her fits seem to start when she puts her nose into a dish of dry food, or shortly after she’s finished eating dry food. she acts as though she can’t catch her breath, then starts the sneezing fit.

but she has some cutie kits!:

and my own recent offspring:

howling woman ann*ifact

just to be clear about yesterday’s blog: no, i don’t think that anyone who china-paints is copying me–i am not under the delusion that i invented china painting. how stupid am i?! it just happens often in my life that i get interested in–obsessed with–some obscure thing, and i feel a private connection with it; and within 6 months, that thing is all the rage, is broadcast all over the media, is prostituted by  walmart, is being “adopted” by silly, vacuous joiners who do it only because it’s a bandwagon, the “in” thing–and the joiners have no clue as to its real significance or value. and my profound love is cheapened and made to seem shallow and casual.

okay, again–an overstatement. in regard to china painting, anyway, although it has occurred with things that mean a whole lot more to me than paint. that’s one reason i don’t like to publicly (i.e. here) talk about my favorite (remote) places or things to do–i want them to remain mine (and Louis’)–i want them to retain their intrinsic value. i want to be able to enjoy them in the state in which i discovered them rather than the cheap, u.s.-american, hyper-real version. the disneyland version. ”look what they’ done to my song, ma . . . “.

and, of course, “they paved paradise, put up a parking lot”.

if china painting is becoming popular, it won’t be long before my “niche market” is no longer a niche.

re: originality–no, i know that “there’s nothing new under the sun” [a favorite quote of people who like to copy/steal/borrow the ideas of others. and probably the only Biblical quote they know. and on discussion forums, i've seen people use that quote and then question who said it! or even mis-attribute it!]. but when an idea arises spontaneously in my head–when i have an “aha! moment”–when in just playing around with things, i get a spark of inspiration–when these are the types of sources for what i make, it is originality. admittedly, there may be unconscious influences from other people’s creations, but those–along with all that i have experienced, seen, felt, heard, suffered, tried, etc in my life–are the amalgam–the raw, combined background material from which my inspiration comes. if i look at something that someone else has done, and then i go try it myself–that is copying, it is unoriginal.

so anyway:

  the key to largo ann*ifact (an original)

still no replacement for kiln. that’s 2-and-a-half months behind schedule i am, and the paragon folks are responsible for it. i am SO P****d.

at this moment i am trying to upload images to photobucket to post here today (i hope!), and they have so much flash bullshit going on that it takes FOR -EVER to upload images on my desperately slow dial-up. another big bite outta my life-moments–due to other people’s carelessness about anyone else’s life.

today i will (assuming i can grab a minute of my own life for myself and not have to sit around waiting on other people for anything) wrap and string a couple more necklaces. i have my half-inch-square glaze test tiles ready to be fired (ahem), and i have 18 pendants clear-glazed, sanded, smoothed, incised, and ready to be fired (ahem). i want to test 3 new red china paint colors i got–to see how they stand up to cone 016 fire.

on the ppio (porcelain painters international online) forum, a guy said that he’d just got back from the nceca (some kinda “clay educators”-or-something national organization) convention, and that it became obvious to him that china painting is making a huge upsurge in popularity [really bad syntax there; pardon me, i'm old]. great. yet another thing that i think i’ve cornered the market on, only to find that within 6 months, it has become a damn’ bandwagon [mixed metaphors there. pardon me, . . .]. he said that imagery is hugely popular.  great. actually, i should be glad that what i “invented” because i love to do it has become where the market is!  i just hate copycats. i hate lack of originality.

so–i think the pics have uploaded, so here they are:

beekay (Louis held the kits so i could get their pics)

  vespers ann*ifact

been awfully busy since we got back from colo/wyo. rolled 18 new pendants, incised the backs, sanded, smoothed, 1st coat of transparent glaze on the part that will be china-painted. finished the first batch of these painted pendants, finally. wrapped and strang one:

disdaining woman

will also now share one of the pendants i painted during lessons in colo (recipient having received it, so i can share without spoiling the surprise):

the other one i painted in colorado isn’t finished. will post it here when it’s done.

kitties are growing–7 eyes open today (django still has one eye unopened). i think our dog may be showing signs of pregnancy–when we got back from up north, it was obvious that she’d filled out. pregnant? no se. could just be maturity.

have glazed .5 ” x .5″ test tiles with my cone 06-04 glazes–will fire them at cone 6 (when i get a functioning kiln)–to see if any hold up. if i could fire them at ^6, it would eliminate a firing in the pendant-making process.

Louis recently finished reading a book about black kettle (i gave the book to L. for Christmas). sand creek massacre and all. i’d like to read it; haven’t read abt sand creek since 1972.

now Louis has taken up my holy book, mormon country. (”holy” to me, not because of the mormon part, but because of the country part).

we went to a party for our grandson’s 1st birthday yesterday (actually, yesterday was the birth anniversary of everett ruess, and grandson’s is really tomorrow, but the party needed to be on the weekend, and folks had other plans on saturday). (excuse me–Louis‘ grandson, my step-grandson). we had fun. the child is just a cutie-patootie! and he has a wonderful family.

weather is springy, and that’s nice. but i still don’t feel like cleaning house. i did do a bit of rearranging and reorganizing in the studio, but cleaning our home is just overwhelming to consider.

we’re both very eager for our trip to the bed-and-breakfast. but whenever we’re away from home, i really miss it. and i really miss working in the studio.

(this would have been the birth anniversary of my sixth, seventh, eighth grade teacher–a lifelong friend. her influence on me is one of the best things that ever happened to me prior to my meeting Louis. and it was her influence that pretty much made me who i am today).

still having kiln problems. i called paragon this morning, and they said they are testing a kiln in their factory using my cone 6 program, and if they get the same results i did, they’ll know it’s just the way this version of the controller works, and i have to get used to it. if their kiln does something different, they’ll know my problems are specific to my kiln, and they’ll replace it. they’re pretty peeved that i’ve bad-mouthed them on forums.

yesterday i did the outlining on 4 pendants–used old black paint while i wait for my new black paint. if the outlines have dried, i will paint those pendants and fire them today (fortunately, i have the “little kiln” for firing china paints). if they’re not dry, i’ll string some necklaces.

a different view of the new folks in the house:

django                                                  pekoe

beekay                                                            chuck

 (i may have pekoe and beekay mixed up; pekoe is darker, weighs more, has longer hair). i weighed these guys two days ago: django-5.8 oz, pekoe-6.0 oz, beekay-4.9 oz, chuck-5.1 oz. i don’t get to play with them much, because abby always comes and grabs them and carries them back to the nest.

i heard a siren a bit ago. i hate that. we don’t often get sirens out here. and once, last july, it was because our neighbor was burning in his car 3 miles away.

had a marvelous time up north. visited family and jackalope jewels LLC president. weather was good.

classes with mariela were great. she’s amazing. (tri-lingual [at least], on top of everything else. and if you know what a linguaphile i am, then you know how impressed i am by mariela’s abilities with languages!). she’s gorgeous, brilliant, amusing, and extremely talented. sheesh.  should i just go crawl into a hole now?

i tried to paint a mini-portrait of Louis, but i failed. it’s a decent-looking dude, but it ain’t Louis! i won’t show it to you. the other two i started in my classes with mvk, i’ll show when they’re finished.

when we got home, there were a few new people in the house, and it was very exciting for me. i will show you them:

django                                             pekoe

beekay                                             chuck

test-fired the !$(#(&%&!~*-ing kiln yesterday. it did the heatwork, but it did not do what i told it to do (i.e. it did not follow my programming). i’m fed up; want my (Louis’) money back.

have 4 more pendants begun, ready for outlining.

the reds on my china-painted pendants burned out in the “new” caldera kiln, so yesterday i re-redded them and refired, but in the little kiln. they’re fine now. today i’m testing the caldera again–to cone 6, little porcelain tiles to later serve as substrate for glaze tests.

made grandson a book about his visit to new mexico in 2007. his papa had sent him and mama down here so papa could try out a new woman. and i guess she passed the try-out, ’cause now mama and papa are divorced, and papa is living with that woman. sheesh. but, of course, none of that is in the book. the book is about what fun we had together as a family. i also made this boy a jackalope jewels coloring book–of my jackalart images. mostly to stimulate his imagination.

Louis has his big car engine in the shop for renovation. it’s a–what? 420? 435? 460?–not sure, but it starts with a 4. i think he’s pretty excited abt it, but he says he’s more excited abt our upcoming vacation in our (2nd?) favorite place in the world. yeah, i’m looking forward to that, too.

but first, we have other things to do. which are also pleasurable, but related to work. mariela lessons, rock-hunting.

cat still hasn’t had kittens. i keep swearing she can’t possibly get any bigger without popping, but there she is–unpopped. dog still doesn’t appear to be pregnant.

there’s a discussion going on on the porcelain painters international online “list” abt whether it’s important to present the art with good pictures and correct spelling, etc in magazines. and, as usual, there is the “if-y’-can-tell-what-they’re-talking-abt,-who-cares-how-they-say-it?” camp, and the other that says excellence and quality (i.e. professionalism) are important.

i think you know which camp i’m in. as i’ve said before, i’ve been thumped repeatedly on discussion fora because i’ve stated that spelling, grammar, punctuation are important. but, of course, it’s so much easier to let it all go–and EASE is what u.s. america is all about in these times. slackin’ . . . standin’ around the water cooler . . . carelessness . . . inattention . . . forcing other people be responsible for what you should be responsible for . . . doing the absolute least y’ can get away with while expecting the absolute most y’ can get. that’s why gambling is so huge now’days. “money for nothin’.” greed and laziness. two of my pet peeves. so many people i “worked” with when i was doing archaeology were greedy and lazy–that’s the main reason i started my own archaeology company. do the job to the best of my ability, and ask reasonable recompense).

so, anyway, i believe in excellence. i’m not always–or even often–capable of it, but it’s my goal. because that’s what we’re here for.

today i’m firing china-painted pendants in the new caldera. without a fan. just to see if it can do that little task (~1319 deg F). actually, i’m doing it because i need to get these fired–it will be final fire for 5 of the 6–and i figured it’d give me an opportunity to test yet another aspect of the heretofore non-functioning brand-new kiln.

been thinking abt why it might be that i’m not as sure of my paintings as of my jewelry. it is this: i have no single, identifiable painting style. i have at least 4 diverse styles, and on the scale of jewelry, it isn’t an issue. but folks who jury paintings into shows require a single “voice”–they consider that a sign of artistic “maturity”. which it may well be, but i’ve never been driven to find a single voice in painting. one of the things i love abt painting (as i have been doing it, lo these many years) is that i can do whatever i want. i don’t have to even think about what someone outside my head would say abt anything i do in painting. it’s total free-form self-expression.

and i have developed a single voice with the jewelry. the “ann*ifacts” are it. and even though the images on the pendants betray my lack of a single painting style, the way i’ve put them together as jewelry is coherent, distinctive, identifiably my own.

time keeps on whizzing . . .

want another pic of Louis with his boat? okay!:

 in this pic, i think he’s trying to make sure all of those horizontal “sticks” line up with each other.

(blurry pic because i don’t often use flash, even when i should).

so i got all pending show apps mailed off. we’ll see what we get . . .

the kiln saga continues. i just can’t believe it’s so damn’ difficult to buy a new kiln that works as it’s supposed to. sheesh! today i have the “new” caldera firing with some glazed pieces inside. see if it gets to cone 05 with a fan blowing at the switch box.

in the meantime, i have 4 more china-painted pendants ready to fire (in the “little kiln”), which i hope will be their final fire.

Louis continues making boats:

–i just can’t understand how he can do that–that eentsy weentsy detail-work. but, hey–it keeps him home at night!

i have been, aside from jousting with kilns and their makers, applying to shows. which is a bloody full-time job in itself, and a major headache. every show requires something different–one wants 4 pics on cd of our work and one of our booth; another wants 3 pics of our work emailed; another wants 4 prints of the work and one of the booth. one show wants 2 sase’s, one with 48 cents return postage, the other with 57 cents postage; another show wants one sase with 60 cents postage; another show doesn’t require a sase at all. one show requires a short biography; another requires an artist’s statement; most require neither, but y’ have to keep track of who wants what, and make sure y’ send the right stuff to the right show. then y’ have to remember to put the postage on the sase(s) before y’ seal the envelope with y’r application in it. and then there’s the money-thing: one show wants jury fee and booth fee on one check, to be deposited upon receipt; another show wants jury fee with application, but booth fee only if y’r accepted; another show wants jury fee on one check, to be deposited upon receipt, and booth fee on another check, to be deposited upon acceptance into the show.

is it any wonder i’m insane??