eidolon art studio cabin fever classes - come feel the earth.

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2-day valentine clay workshop:

Build your sweetie a valentine’s present in this two day workshop. Learn how to build pots with coils, slabs or pinch. Make a mask or build a sculpture - surprise that darling!

Meets from 1-3pm Saturdays, January 14 and 28. First class build your gift, take a week off for pieces to dry and fire to bisque, and then come back to glaze. Pick up will be by February 1 after the glaze firing.

Cost: $60

Contact tara at tara@eidolonartstudio.com or 773-381-5462.

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4-week handbuilding with clay class:

A 4 week intensive on handbuilding with clay. Pinch pots, coil pots and slab pots can all be explored. Or perhaps you are interested in sculpting! This will happen too! It all depends on your interest and what you can do in 4 weeks. The class is non-structured, but I will be here to help each person individually create what they want. If you are unsure of what you want to do, then we'll explore different techniques to find one that you like.

The class will spend 4 Tuesday evening working on pieces. A week's break will be taken (so our pieces can dry) and then we'll come back to glaze our pieces. For the last class swing by and pick up your art. If people are interested, we can use this time to critique each other's work. If not, then just come by to take your art home.

Class 1: Tuesday, January 17 (6-9pm)
Class 2: Tuesday, January 24 (6-9pm)
Class 3: Tuesday, January 31 (6-9pm)
Class 4: Tuesday, February 6 (6-9pm)
NO CLASS Tuesday, February 14 (pieces are drying for the firing)
Class 5: Tuesday, February 21 (GLAZING PIECES 6-9pm)
Class 6: Tuesday, February 28 (PICK UP PIECES 6-9pm)

This class includes a 25lb bag of stoneware, studio glazes and firing of pieces - all for just $125!!! What a great way to make some handmade gifts inexpensively! And you learn about a wonderful, earthy medium - clay.

Cost: $125

Offer limited to the first 8 people who reply and sign up. Clay needs beyond the 25lbs will be at a cost of $35 per 25lb bag (includes use of glazes).

Contact tara at tara@eidolonartstudio.com or 773-381-5462.

what could be better?

What could be better than having a class of people who are having fun, digging into the earth, finding common spaces to share and a community being structured?

I think that our Tuesday night class was the most fun that I've had in good long time. The energy of the people and being able to play our ideas off each other. I found it to be an amazing experience. I can only hope that the next class goes as well.

The firing produced a lot of beautiful pieces by everyone. The glazes are amazing. Once I fire J's medallions, I will post a picture of the color pallette that we are working with. So far, I think the Laguna Morrocan Sand glazes give the kind of brilliance and depth that I would like to see more of in my own art. Especially the forest green. All are very glossy, not matted. Remember firing at cone 5/6.

Life is good.

Tuesday Class!!!

I had such a great time last night with the class. Everyone was so friendly and personable. We had a lovely time getting our fingers dug into the dirt and sharing stories. I really look forward to the next class.

Class begins and I learn more about the Amaco Kiln

Today has been a great day! The first pottery class begins tonight and I am sooo excited. Excited to share my love of clay with others. It's good. So I went to the Chicago Ceramic Supply Company to buy clay for the class. I bought a different type of stoneware. It's all white and smooth - no flecks. I think that this will be better when it comes to glazes and the results being more in line with people's expectations ( I think the colors will more accurately reflect what people expect).

As I was talking with the man at the desk he asked about a studio and I launched into my speal on what we do Eidolon. He became very interested in the kiln firing aspect and said that he deals with a lot of people who are looking for that service and could he refer them to me?? YES! So another bridge is built and hopefully we will see more people coming through our doors. This is huge for me because I don't know of another ceramic supply place near me so I might be the only one with a kiln that is accessible to people in Evanston and north Chicago. My illustration with the story is that you just never know when an opportunity will present itself. Live in the moment!

Small steps.

Also, I taught myself how to program the Amaco kiln to hold a low temp for several hours to dry out wet/damp pieces. I've held Kristin's class work at 200º for 5 hours. I will fire the kiln tonight while class is going. This is all so fun for me. Well, time to let loose and learn a little more.

Ceramic Opportunities at Eidolon Art Studio

OFFER ONE: Eidolon Open Clay Studio Monthly Offer:

1. 15 hours of wheel time - value at $120
2. (1) 25lb bag of stoneware - value at $35
3. Unlimited use of space during open studio hours. Time can be used to clean up pots, handbuild or glaze pots. Hard to put a value on this one.
4. 6-8 pieces fired/month - value at appx. $15-45 (Can fire more, but at a per-piece cost)
5. One dedicated shelf to artist.

A total of $150-180 value.

We're offering the above for $100 per month with a three month commitment. After the three months are up, we can both assess whether this is working out and if you want to bow out, no problem. If we both would like to continue, Angela and I would be happy to have you as a part-time Eidoloner.


OFFER 2: Hourly/Daily Rental of Wheel or Time for Handbuilding.

We offer over 40 hours of open studio time per week and you can come in and use the potter's wheel or handbuild for $8/hr. If you want to make a day's commitment you receive one hour for free - 6hrs for $40.

We sell cone 5/6 stoneware for $35 per 25lb bag of clay. The cost includes use of studio glazes.


OFFER 3: 6-week Pottery Class.

I'll be offering a 4 week intensive on handbuilding with clay. Pinch pots, coil pots and slab pots can all be explored. Or perhaps you are interested in sculpting! This will happen too! It all depends on your interest and what you can do in 4 weeks. The class is non-structured, but I will be here to help each person individually create what they want. If you are unsure of what you want to do, then we'll explore different techniques to find one that you like.

The class will spend 4 Tuesday evening working on pieces. A week's break will be taken (so our pieces can dry) and then we'll come back to glaze our pieces. For the last class swing by and pick up your art. If people are interested, we can use this time to critique each other's work. If not, then just come by to take your art home.

Here's the schedule:

Class 1: Tuesday, November 15 (7-10pm)
Class 2: Tuesday, November 22 (7-10pm)
Class 3: Tuesday, November 29 (7-10pm)
Class 4: Tuesday, December 6 (7-10pm)
Class 5: Tuesday, December 13 (GLAZING PIECES 7-10pm)
Class 6: Tuesday, December 20 (PICK UP PIECES 7-10pm)

This class includes a 25lb bag of stoneware, studio glazes and firing of pieces - all for just $125!!! What a great way to make some handmade holiday gifts inexpensively! And you learn about a wonderful, earthy medium - clay.

Offer limited to the first 8 people who reply and sign up. Sign-up will mean that you have paid your class fee. Clay needs beyond the 25lbs will be at a cost of $35 per 25lb bag (includes use of glazes).


Please feel free to invite others who might be interested.

2nd Glaze Firing

So, the first of the glaze firings did not work out. Somehow I did not clear out the computer program and it fired at 06. ERGH. So I refired the batch and it did actually work. It fired for 8.33hrs on the glaze. One of the pots had bubblie glaze. I guess from refiring it as I have not seen this happen with this glaze before.

Paulus Berensohn Quote

Here's a great quote from Paulus Berensohn regarding clay. This quote has made my day on many occasions. I hope that you find inspiration in it too! If you haven't picked up Berensohn's book, Finding One's Way with Clay, it's a fabulous book and one every potter should own. It journals his experience with pinchpots. His forms are incredible. I was lucky enough to meet this man when I worked at Clayground in Cambridge, MA.

"A clue picked up my ears when I read that there are 90,000 sense receptors per square inch on human finger tip. Imagine that! 90,000 tiny satellite dishes listening, 90,000 antennas broadcasting, 90,000 rootlets drinking interdependancy, making connection. "Hands:" conscious hands-on-clay.

This "information" was on a page of a book. It fired my imagination It came into my body and my fingertips began to tremble. They tremble every time I think "90,000" or speak it out. The clay smiles and I tremble. This is one of the two most powerful possibilities I have to offer as a teacher of clay. I keep saying it, 90,000, like a mantra, hoping I'll be overheard by those willing to receive it.

The other threshold deeper into what pinching clay has to give us came into consciousness one day in a small article in the New York Times, or was it Newsweek magazine, or did I dream it: about the work of a Dr. Leila Coyne at the University of California at San Jose, who says that if you were to hit a one pound ball of clay wiht a hammer it would give off ultraviolet light for a month! A month? I was, am, staggered. Finding that bit of information and attempting to live it in my body has changed everything.

Every time we pinch clay, coil it, roll it into slabs or form it on the potter's wheel, we are releasing light, palpating energy with our 90,000 sense receptors per square inch of fingertip, whether we know it or not. I want to know it. God knows how I want to know it! I changed the title of my pinching workshops to "shining clay" in an atempt to generate awe and wonder for the light that lives in and radiates out of living clays-and knowing it in the biblical sense of "knowing". Soon, I'm to give another evolution of the workshops that have birthed this book. All I have so far is its public title, "Clay and the Cosmic Story". Privately I'm hoping to have the courage and/or foolishness to call it "Hands on God: the reciprocity between our human senses and the more than human sensuous loam of the earth with its story-telling stones, with its life-giving clays"."

Cone 5 Glaze Firing: Amaco EX1099sf

Today is the first time I'm firing a glaze firing in the Amaco. Again, I have no idea what's going to happen with this firing.
Here's what to do:
Always hit enter first.
Hit "Cone Fire" button (prfi) - Enter (erase previous program)
Then hit "Cone Fire" button and the cone number you want. (I did cone 5) -Enter
Then the computer asked me "how fast" and I hit "Medium" - Enter
Then computer said "HLD" I input 15 (minutes) - Enter (The Amaco engineer explained that this secret would allow my glazes to fully mature - more lustre???)
Then the computer goes to the idle temperature and hit "Start"


The kiln is rising about 200 degrees every hour. I think it should hit 2185 degrees F. It's at 1700 degrees right now. I'm soooo excited. The computerized kiln is amazing. It is incredible to be able to program a firing and then be able to walk away and check in on my own time schedule. With the little Paragon, I had to be around every hour to manually turn it up. And I had to commit to 4 hours to do a firing. Things are going to be different around here : )