A Ceramic Relief - in more ways than one.

Terrible accident in front of me on the motorway yesterday evening meant I was an hour late for my ceramics class and so was only able to part-glaze my Gare du Nord.

The good news, of course, was that it emerged from the kiln completely intact. Unfortunately, a day-time student had accidentally knocked off two of the little statues that sit atop the piece - but they can be simply stuck back on. Apparently, the student was very upset and reacted as if she had knocked over a vase from the Ming dynasty.

Here it is:

The next stage was to mix up a light green glaze with which the main body of the facade will be painted. The windows will be glazed with something called "Evening Shadow".

In fact, I began with the darker "Evening Shadow", ran out of time and will come back during the week - as a special arrangement - to apply the light green glaze.

I'll have to be VERY careful  to make sure the light green glaze is just that   -  "light".

Here is the facade with the "Evening Shadow" applied.

PS The little green tile that I had hoped to take home has still to be given its final glossy glaze and fired so it's still as it was in yesterday's blog.

PPS The technique I described in a much earlier blog whereby one takes a terracotta tile and "paints" it with a pale glaze which one then scrapes away can be seen to great effect in these two tiles by a fellow student.

I'm still minded to use such tiles as part of the background scenery for the layout with a final tapestry background beyond them, and the 3D ceramic buildings in the foreground, like so:

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Osmo Vanska:

Was listening to an interview with the Finnish conductor Osmo Vanska who has apparently elevated the Minnesota Symphony Orchestra to be one of the most highly regarded in the world.

Vanska also plays clarinet in a small ensemble made up of other members of the orchestra. In that ensemble he is a mere player and takes the lead from the others.

He opined that it was good for him to switch between being the person who usually issued instructions to the orchestra  and (when in the ensemble) being on the receiving end of instructions from the same people.

It reminded me of the democratic arrangement in many religious communities where the leader of the community was rotated every few years by election of the members. But unlike in most secular situations, the leader didn't simply retire or resign but reverted to being a mere member.

Osmo and his orchestra