Agnes Husz – Make a wave shape platter with beautiful colored texture on it

I am Agnes Husz; ceramic artist living in Japan.

When you see my works, it is not surprising to feel a kind of Japanese atmosphere.
All my works are hand build from long flat clay strips, what I use to call “obi”, that means the belt of the Japanese Kimono. This gives the main characteristic to my works.
I make platters, bowls, sculptural forms or even large object in the same way.
When at the first time I stretched out the clay strip by hand, I was fascinated by the natural answer of the clay. I got a long, thin, but strong and flexible clay belt. It happened 30 years ago when I rolled on my first spiral object. This was the start to develop a new way of making, and now I am going to share this knowledge with you.
Probably it sounds strange, but I always start the work with the color. Therefore, the color, the embossed surface appears already on the form, naturally decorating the ready piece, as an integral part of the finished object.
In my workshop I will demonstrate for you every important detail.
I will teach you how to make a wavy shape platter, based on this design.
Come and enjoy my course and be inspired!

After this workshop, you could be making amazing work like this:

In my workshop I will demonstrate how I make the waved shape platters, several design in forms, with beautiful color on it. I will be teaching you:
/ how to stretch out the clay slab by hand, to make a long flat clay strip what is the basic element of the design.
/ how to reach the natural embossed effect and color on the surface
/ how to bring the strip to shape and many more useful tricks!

Workshop steps:

1/ preparing the clay slab
2/ make the color engobe
3/ paint on the clay slab surface
4/ stretch out the clay by hand
5/ make a platter design out of the clay strip
6/ finishing procedures

Required Materials & Equipment List:

/stoneware, fine-grained clay with high plasticity (4~6 Kg)
/color pigments 30-50 gram (any kind of color pigments, or just different color clay, or kaolin, or porcelain) and basic transparent glaze (just a cup of) to make color engobe
/a mixer or a porcelain bowl and stir bar to mix the color ingredients.
/plastic container with lid for the color engobe (as many as you want to make)
/some piece of fabric sheet ( for example old kitchen cloths or bed sheet) smooth, flat touch one, not relief decoration on it (size about 70 x 40cm / 2~4 sheets)
/a piece of gauze or other cloth like gauze ( 10 x 30cm about)
/if you don’t have slab roller machine, then a rolling pin and
wooden sticks of various thicknesses (about 1.5~1cm x 2 piece) to finish the flat slab in the necessary thickness
/a long plastic or metal ruler to make the surface smooth
/knife, cutter, sculptural tools
/flat brush from hard hair (any cheap brush, for example pig or horse hair)
if you want to use different colors at the same time, good to have a brush for each color (size as you like, 2~6cm wideness)
/bowl, bucket, sponge, cutting wire, hard type tooth brush
/a long, smooth table board
/sponge sheets x2 ( size as big, as the platter you want to make, the thickness is 1.5~2 cm) and some small piece of sponges

When you buy this workshop, you get:

• Watch my Live Online Workshop
  • The workshop is around 1:45 hour long.
• Bonus Q&A
  • Join my bonus Q&A where I answered questions about my process face-to-face
• Lifetime Access to the Replays
  • The workshop and the Q&A are recorded, and you will have lifetime access to it. You can watch it online, or download it to your device to watch offline at any time

Agnes Husz, a Hungarian born ceramic artist in Japan.
In 1990 she received her master’s degree from the Moholy-Nagy University of Arts and Design in Budapest.
It is in Holland in 1993 at the European Ceramics Work Center where she develops her first objects made of clay-strips. This unique way of creating shapes with rustic, long, flat clay strips open infinite new possibilities filled with a special aesthetic sense, and is now her signature.
As she is living and working in Japan since 1993, It is not surprising to see a certain asian flavor in her artwork. Immersion in the mysteries of nature, the tradition and the philosophies of this culture has instinctively brought her to entwine influences of the East and the West.
Whirls, bandaged shapes, spirals implying the motion of binding and loosing, of drawing in and swinging out, bowls or beautiful colored soft shape sculptures.

A never-ending circumvolution of living forces through nature into infinite in bowls or platters to large scale sculptures, installations.
She participates symposiums, residences worldwide, giving lectures and workshops.
She has been awarded prizes in juried exhibitions in Japan and foreign countries.
In 2015 she won the Ferenczy Noemi Prize from the Ministry of Cultural Heritage, Hungary.
From 2013 she is elected member of the IAC International Academy of Ceramics, Geneva.

Artist Statement:
Expression in Clay

The ritual is in my work.
Stretching the clay strip by hand, flinging it up into the air, and slapping it down on a board. Enjoying this process is just like letting myself be one with the work and being part of the Universe.
Hence, the inside structure of the clay is modified, giving a beautiful relief to the surface that adds a particular aesthetic to the work. However, not this beauty was my goal. I need the thin, long flat clay-strip or slab to make a shape, and it is only possible in this way.
For me this is a language through I talking to the Earth, the Man, the Universe. A language comes through the material, time and gravity. The strokes of the time emboss on the surface, because it comes through the gravity. At the end all the details of this conversation freeze in the last moment where we can see the time the gravity and all the energies that extinguish or reinforce each other.
The work is finished, but not complete. It develops further in accordance with the immediate surroundings and will always reveal something new.

www.instagram.com/agnes_husz_ceramics