Author: admin

Ce n’est jamais facile pour un jeune de trouver un stage, je le sais par mes enfants qui ont eu besoin de trouver des stages. Je pense que c’est une des raisons qui me poussent à accueillir dans mon atelier des étudiants. Et depuis que je coule, il est maintenant beaucoup plus facile de les accueillir. Le coulage demande moins d’apprentissage que le tournage.

En général, je les intègre facilement dans ma chaîne de production : coulage, décor, cuisson. Cela me permet de remplir efficacement les boutiques en attente de réassort; On suit un bon rythme et les étagères se remplissent vite.

Je propose toujours aux stagiaires d’avoir aussi un petit projet personnel de décor, de production, une fois qu’ils se sont familiariser avec la production.

Ce sont de belles aventures humaines !

Cela fait maintenant quelque temps que je me suis mise à l’aquarelle. Une belle aventure qui a commencé en 2021 par des vacances très pluvieuses. Mon modèle de prédilection est l’oiseau de nos jardins : rouge gorge, tarin…J’aime poser les ombres pour que le volume apparaisse, un vrai plaisir de détente.

Et puis ces petites aquarelles ont fini par trouver leur chemin vers les tasses ! C’est tout nouveau !

Deux expos pour cette fin d’année !

La première avec Histoire de copines  à Cognac du 27 novembre au 2 décembre. Je continue l’aventure avec 3 complices : Sandrine Andersson (bijoux), l’atelier de Valérianne (santons) et Muriel Geoffroy (feutres). Nous investissons la salle du prieuré du couvent des Récollets à Cognac au 53 rue d’Angoulême.

La deuxième expo est organisée par l’association Argilités  qui regroupe les céramistes du Poitou Charentes. On sera 14 céramistes.

Les horaires : 10h 19 h pour les 2 expos

Transfer has the enormous advantage of requiring little material: a laser printer, metal oxides, gum Arabic and linseed oil.

Of course, you need very good quality illustrations. All the ones I use are originals: drawings or photos worked.

Here are the steps :

Glazing is one of the cornerstones of ceramics. A bad glaze and it’s all wrong

For my part, I chose to glaze only the inside of my pieces, preferring to leave raw and soft porcelain for the outside.

All the glazes in the workshop are made by myself. I like these times of precise weighing. No doubt my past as a chemist is steel very present. Initially, a glaze contains silica and kaolin. However, a flux must be added so that the couple melts at a lower temperature. At high temperatures (1280 – 1300°C), the usual fluxes are potash, soda or magnesium. For earthenware, it is more difficult to lower the temperature of the Kaolin silica pair, lead has been used a lot, very powerful. Now, more concerned about the health effects of the products, we are moving towards lead-free glaze.

To glaze, you can dip the ceramic in it. But for myself almost always spray. The glaze is suspended in water and does not dissolved. When applied to the porous ceramic, the ceramic adsorbs water and the powder remain on the ceramic. When fired, the fine powder melts like glass.

A few years ago, I decided to cast my pieces into plaster molds. Be careful, this does not mean that it is simpler when it comes to making molds.

First you have to make the prototypes. I favor raw earth for my cups. I turn and mold them directly without firing. For larger ceramics, I turn or model the prototypes and I biscuit them.

Of course, there are different types of molds from the simplest to some very complicated one including 20 different parts. For the moment, I limit myself to 4 parts.  The idea for me is to make prints of parts that I can assemble. The Square vase, for example, is the assembly of a cup and a rectangular cube. I can decline like that to infinity.

The paper clay training of 18th and 19th of February gave me the opportunity to immerse myself in this practice. I use to practice a lot at the beginning 2010. I tinted it, pressed it, cut it, to stick it on mugs, boxes, vases or even make sculptures.

This practice gives the opportunity to work longer. Even if the clay dries, you can continue to work. It is less fragile. When fired, the paper burns and it looks like pure porcelain.

During this workshop, we made and dyed paper porcelain on Saturday. The next day we pressed the porcelain to stick it on cups and make different patterns. We also used paper porcelain to print it in molds. Some have experimented with making a chain. While the drying porcelain would be extremely fragile, the paper clay strengthens when drying and presents an amazing solidity. I thank my students for having opened up the fields for me again !

January and February, 2 full months, I hope, to dedicate myself to imagine my new pieces. Last year at the same time, I worked on a lot on masks by implementing constraints like, the mask must have 3 parts… I drew a bunch of little sketches. This led to my series of Moon masks and the Sisters busts that were my flagship products of Maison et Objet 2022.

What does 2023 have in store for me? I already have some ideas. I’ll tell you about all this very soon.