Gosia, known for crafting intimate ceramic figures, contributed a sculpture to “Hi-Fructose Presents: The Art of the Mushroom” at The Compound Gallery. See her step-by stepinsight into making the piece, titled “Enoki,” below.
* The first steps involved in crafting the figure, with the artist saying she “originally envisioned a circular piece, and my challenge was to create a figure that would fit that without distorting it too much.”
* “At this point I chose to ‘sink’ the legs down into the background to preserve the circular shape,” the artist says.
* Next, Gosia hollowed out the figure, to get it ready to be fired in the kiln. “This stage can be scary and intimidating but you just have to know what to do,” she writes. “I suggest practicing with smaller pieces first … ” The artist offers how-to videos linked in her profile.
* “Finally came time for the mushrooms!” Gosia says. “I chose enoki for their graceful and magical quality.”
* For the actual firing post, Gosia advised not to look too closely at the images for exact reference material in creating similar pieces. “Due to time constrictions, I broke all kinds of rules and not everything went as smoothly as it should have,” she says.
* And here we have the final product, currently shown at The Compound Gallery through Dec. 9. Additional images and insight can be found at her Instagram account.
