Artist Statement

As I expand my horizons in shape and form, I thought it would be interesting to try some different types of forms this trimester due to distance learning. This specific project gave me the chance to work with creating similar pieces while still making it my own vision. I really wanted to use Nolan’s wood-fired pieces as inspiration due to his use of colors and form. Contrasting usual bottles, it has an organic appearance to it. He created a set of bottles that were miscellaneous and had no real organization about them. I based my design on Nolan’s, changing it in shape and color to suit my own bottle set. I created four bottles, each one slightly larger than the last to create an organized set. I used a mix of clay, creating two bottles with white clay and two with stoneware clay. Tying the two pieces together is the use of earthy color, letting the color highlight the bottle form and show the organic shape.

This piece focuses almost solely on the elements of Shape brought out by the curvature of the bottles body, and the thin neck leading to the mouth of the bottle. The Emphasis of the bottles is clearly on these elements and makes it easy to understand the rest of the form which brings out a certain variety with the flowing form of the bottles to the earthy color.

This project allowed me to learn how to use other mediums to plan projects in the future when I can work with clay again. This allows for me to have a plan going into future projects. I have seen how I can still create my art through other means, using watercolors to bring the project to life from the paper. While I am used to using clay for my art I have seen how I can still have a creative outlet. Also deriving ideas from other artists has been a good learning experience, and now I have more project ideas that I can’t wait to use once I’m back in the studio!

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The process was as follows:

  - Pick a project from Nolan’s portfolio to derive inspiration from
  - Gather materials, Paper, pencil, brushes, watercolors
  - Using a pencil, lightly sketch the outline of the four bottles
  - Lightly color in the background of the bottles
  - Use darker colors to create a pattern
  - Outline the peace for completion
  - Let dry
  - Make final touch-ups