Looking at Lotte Reiniger's Work

Even though my Animation elective wont start till next week I have decided to at least research artists. Today   I am looking at Lotte Reiniger, who was German artist (born in 1899 and died 1981), she was one of the very first silhouette animators and was also a film director. She was known for making productions of fairy tales using a method known as stop motion today. She used cut out images which she then moved and took pictures of.


Here is a link to her video about Hänsel and Gretel:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KxkIGXVwZTM



This is a link of her production of Däumelinchen:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vDojanzKKmw


There is another link to one of her productions about Cinderella:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kku75vGDD_0

My finished Dragon Head

Coloured Ceramic Pieces

The following pieces were made out of clay then put into the kiln. They were then painted and fired once again.



This bowl was spun on the wheel

This was made using the pinch-pot method

Two pinch-pots were made and put together. Spikes were then glued on top using slip.

This is how I displayed my pieces for the Assessment

Naked Raku Technique

Here are images of the two Naked Raku pieces (the method is roughly explained in the earlier post):

Ceramic: Raku & Naked Raku Technique

The Ceramic Elective ended this week and after next week the Animation Elective will start. I am already thinking of ideas for the short animation we will be doing next week. I have a feeling that the ceramic assessment didn't go too bad but I should have tried harder for the journal part.


The following ceramic pieces were glazed using the Raku technique or the Naked Raku technique. The difference between the two is that the normal Raku technique leaves a shiny glaze but the Naked Raku leaves a matt glaze which is slightly dull looking. In Raku the glaze is only put on once but in the Naked Raku the glaze has to be put on twice. Another difference is that one can scratch a design into Naked Raku but the outcome will be black and white where in the other Raku  technique other colour glazes are available. The parts with no glaze on them will turn black. Raku is a technique were the ceramic pieces go straight into a bin full of saw dust after being taken out of the kiln. The lid is then closed and the smoke will create Raku pieces. After the ashes are cleaned away the piece is finished. The glazes for Naked Raku will come off like egg-shells.


 Raku Technique (white & turquoise glazes were used):

  

The pictures of the Naked Raku Technique will be on the next post.

Dragon's Head

When I was having a bad day I decided to take a break from the ceramics project and started forming a dragon's head out of clay. I used the same methods which I used in the other pieces to give the dragon head  a variety of different textures. It was a lot of fun to create. If I had more clay I would love to make full body dragon. Maybe someday I will.

Here are pictures of the dragon before he was put into the kiln :

Experimenting with clay

This week I have been trying out different forms and textures that had something to do with the word brainstorm I made of the organic and the man-made object. But mostly have been just experimenting different ways I could achieve textures. I learned how to make pinch-pots and make a ball by putting two together. It was interesting to learn this method but I wasn't very good at it. I think that I was better at using the wheel to make a bowl.

Here are pictures of the pieces I made before thy were put into the kiln:

This picture is the organic object from which I drew pictures and made a brainstorm of which I then used to create random forms with textures. In the word brainstorm were words like sharp, spiky, rough, edgy and things like that. For some reason is the picture of the man-made object is not loading but it was a whisk. For that I wrote down words like smooth, shiny and curvy.