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March Club Night - Tuscany, Italy with Eve Hope After viewing some of Eve’s platters, bowls and cups from her collection from Rampini Ceramiche she proceeded to demonstrate her decoration technique on one of her casserole dishes. Eve, who has a fine arts degree from UoC, left her job in Auckland in 1992 for 2 months and travelled to Italy to help a her cousin who had opened a restaurant in the Tuscan countryside just south of Florence. Whilst there she was introduced to the Rampini Family who had established a pottery studio close to where she was staying. As Eve has always had an interest in colour and designs of Italian maiolica she could not resist asking if she might try her hand at decorating. Eve admits her early work was a little shaky but was not too long before she felt confident enough to begin exploring the colours and experimenting with new designs. She is grateful to the Rampini family for their open acceptance to having a Kiwi designing and decorating Italian ceramics. Their friendship and collaboration worked so well Eve gave up her job in NZ remained as their principle designer until 2008. Her developed skill was on display for us to see and enjoy at our club night. The casserole dish and lid had an external white, tin glaze. The under-glaze stains were in powdered form; Eve mixed them with water to a formula. She also colour mixed to create just the right hue. Her brushes are from Pelo di Bue, bought from Italy, those used for outlining have been specifically cut and shaped for the job and are used by most Maiolica pottery studios in Italy and we all admired the wonderful marks she made with them. Interestingly, the clay of the dish, the stains and glazes are different from those that are used in Tuscany, so we await in anticipation for their exit from the kiln. We’ll let you know.  Thank you, Eve, for the demonstration of your skill and some insights into your time in Italy.
Hi potters, just an update of where the club is this month. Our web site is up and running at last, please check us out. We will have all our information there; what is planned for the rest of the term and who is teaching. This will become our main contact; we also use our Facebook page (don't forget to 'like' us!). Quite an achievement for us with a small working committee. The constitution has been re-written; this will be checked out soon and we will call a special general meeting to pass these amendments. Contact mtpleasantpottery@gmail.com for a copy. I hope you will support us by being at the meeting as a quorum of 16 is required. The date is yet to be confirmed. Club night: (Second Tuesday of April), 10th April at 7pm Eve Hope will discus her experiences working in Italy at a majolica studio/factory. Eve will give us an idea how the pieces were made and will have some samples of their work. It will be interesting to hear what working in a controlled workshop is really like. Hub interest day is Friday 23rd March; come and see what is going on at the hub. The potters have made tiles for the pizza oven surround; these will be fixed to the base soon. They have been made by some of the groups in the hub and we have just made another seven to complete the surround. The raku area is under construction in front of the rooms. This will be a small safe area for raku firing. The burner is fixed, so we just need to pick a saturday in April for firing? Anyone interested contact us mtpleasantpottery@gmail.com Wood firing: we can share the wood kiln at Halswell for a combined firing for anyone interested in June/July. A little work will be involve stacking and chopping of wood, also a roster of morning & afternoon stoking. Perhaps a Tuesday night discussion on what is expected in a wood firing, some time in May would be good. Everyone who is interested please contact us at mtpleasantpottery@gmail.com Subs are due; if you have received a friendly reminder to pay, please pay; if not and you haven’t paid, please pay and advise and also, if not, many thanks to those who have responded. It makes the running of the group a lot easier (it’s about cash-flow). Kiln firings are hotting up (boom boom); if you would like your work fired, contact us and we will arrange a time that is suitable for you and to help you load the kiln. The last two weeks before classes finish, the kilns are booked for students only. The dates are Monday 2nd to Friday 13th April. Prepare your work before or after these dates, please. I (Shona) spent a very pleasant two hours, two weeks ago, at Canterbury potters learning to repair broken pottery by Kintsugi (meaning connecting things). One of my earlier works, a toilet roll cylinder, broke and it had been sitting for a while (five yrs), this opportunity came up and now I have a gold masterpiece! Welcome to our new students and members, we hope you enjoy our group. Any questions: please email us and we will endeavour to answer them. Cheers - Your Committee  |
Mount Pleasant Pottery Group Incorporated
140 Main Road, Redcliffs
Christchurch, New Zealand
140 Main Road, Redcliffs
Christchurch, New Zealand
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