Monday, August 12, 2013

Ode to Monitors -- Laura Marmash

No photo available.  Please see website for work: http://lauramarmash.com/Home.html




1. What is your name (I may not always be able to tell by your email)?
Laura Marmash


2. When did you start coming to Lillstreet? 
2006

3. What brought/brings you to Lillstreet?
The opportunity for a personal, creative outlet.


4. What is the nature of your clay work -- functional or sculptural? 
Mainly figure sculpture, but I am currently enrolled in a soda class and revisiting the wheel.

5. What is your process? Do you sketch, prototype and conceptualize? etc.
Depends on the piece. Some figure sculptures are purely representations from live models, others are conceptualized to evoke a mood or feeling.

6. What or who influence your work?
Cristina Cordova is my favorite figure sculptor. Her works are beautiful and haunting, plus her mastery of the figure AND the medium is hugely inspiring.

7. Do you work with other medium besides clay?
I've been playing with ways to incorporate other materials with clay, such as fabric, wood and wool. The challenge for me is to make the added material feel "as one" with the clay, not just an afterthought. It's tricky to get the mix just right.

8. What are your duties as a monitor?
I am a claymaker, and am responsible for making 1000 lbs of clay each month. Making clay at Lillstreet is more art than science. You have to feel the clay for moisture content and plasticity, and add either more dry clay powder or slaked clay until the mixture is just right. 

9. If there’s one thing you absolutely have to inform the Lillstreet clay community that would make your work easier, what would it be?
Try not to allow "foreign materials" to get into the clay reclaim barrels. Especially paper towels. When scooping the slaked clay from the barrels sometimes there are pockets of black gunk that's really stinky. Very nasty stuff!

However, the occasional chamois or clay tool is like the prize in a cracker jack box. You never know what you are going to get.




































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