Post #731951 by TikiAno on Sat, Nov 22, 2014 6:09 PM

A long time since posting. Thanks, Wendy, for all of the well wishes. Tiki Ari has been doing well, eating, growing, and doing everything a baby is supposed to do (mainly pooping).

We had come up with his name, Ari, before his birth, but didn't tell anyone. It means "lion" in Hebrew (my wife is Israeli), so I started working on a number of lion- related non-tiki items. I know, it's not the place to post non-tiki stuff, but the second wall tile I made is mid century- styled, ALMOST tiki? In any case, these have been bisque fired, and will be glazed soon:

Each is approximately 7-8" tall:

I've been working on two different mugs for the upcoming TC Art Swap. The theme is "Hawaiian Shirts," so I sketched out my idea- make a mug that IS an aloha shirt. I haven't seen this design before, so it seemed like a good approach. (Sorry if you've seen these photos already on that thread):

First I built the form for a mug out of a slab of clay:

Then attached the bottom to the cylinder form:

I let it firm up, then started working on the basic design:

Added a collar, pocket, and sleeves...

Another potter at the studio I work at saw my slab form, and offered to throw a mug to work on at the same time. She threw it, then trimmed it, and left it for me to work on. Linda's been giving me feedback on each piece. She's a great potter and is always stoked to see what kind of tiki project I'm in the middle of:

I'm working on the slab piece, made entirely by me, for the Art Swap piece, and the wheel thrown form for fun. The slab form is quite a bit taller. The plan was for each to have mismatched seams of the "fabric," as many poorly constructed Aloha Shirts have.

I let each dry up a bit, then started sketching out the design and then started carving. Here's the Slab Mug first:

The wheel thrown mug has a bit more "shoulders," but basically has the same (well, similar) design:

I let this firm up, then added coconut buttons to the form and kept carving:

The two of them together:

Mahalo for the visit!