Blog Post 10 – Agueda Zabisky
If we break down the phrase “stepping out of our comfort zone,” it means doing things that we don’t feel comfortable doing or pushing ourselves into unfamiliar places to do things that we wouldn’t normally do.
This was one of my main goals with the Creative Pinellas’ Emerging Artist Grant 2023, which was announced last October. I wanted to go above and beyond by challenging myself to make larger and more geometric ceramic sculptures.
It has been a very intense process, primarily due to time constraints. The exposition opens on May 4, and all my sculptures need to be delivered by early April (two weeks from now!!!!)
In ceramics, things do not happen so fast and any attempt to rush the process can be catastrophic. Well, I started by opening the slabs and as the pieces had to be larger, it required me to work all of them in one day in order to create, and modeling the artwork the next days.
I started several pieces at the same time with the slabs and, concurrently, I also initiated the heads of my project. I worked on everything simultaneously, taking care to always keep the pieces very well protected in order to ensure the moisture of the clay during the process.
Integrating pieces that were made separately into a single sculpture was an additional challenge. They needed to be at the same humidity point, otherwise it would lead to different clay contractions when they lose moisture and dry, creating the risk of cracks.
Obviously, there were some unforeseen events. In some cases, I needed to redo pieces or rethink how to make them differently.
Ultimately, mistakes and continued attempts teach us that there are other possibilities.
