I'm guessing that maybe two, or three people if I'm lucky, will focus on and recognize my cups in their catalog. But I still think its pretty cool that the decorator picked my work to fit in with what they consider to be "modern contemporary living".

Maybe they saw my work on current display at NCC in the "Functional Redesign" show that is up for another week. If you're in or around Minneapolis, please go check it out.

First, I am ecstatic to say that I was selected as an Emerging Artist by NCECA! There were six of us, and we spoke at the closing ceremonies on Saturday morning. NCECA received a Windgate Charitable Foundation grant, and because of that we had a show, extensive publicity, and received a financial award. Pretty fantastic if I do say so myself. Here are images of the 3 pieces I put into the Emerging Show...

I was very fortunate to be in five other shows during the conference. A quick rundown...

-Foster/White hosted the Bray show titled "Table of Content". I had the following piece, Eight,  installed there..

I have made a webpage about Eight that tells the full story, for now it is only on the mobile version of my site, which can be seen here.

-At the Seattle Design Center, I was in a show Steve Godfrey curated titled "National Porcelain Invitational". I had this very red coffee service, and a few singles...

-At the Elysian Brewery up on Capitol Hill, I was in a show Stephen Robinson curated titled "Steins". Brand new stein, very similar to the one I made last year, but a little bit smaller. I say "smaller" because I shrank it from an absurd 34oz down to a more reasonable 22oz...

-I was featured by Red Lodge Clay Center at their NEXPO booth, with a few singles and this set...

-At La Mesa, hosted by Santa Fe Clay at the ACT Theater. This is always one my favorite shows as a place to see really great pots. The place setting I sent..

What a whirlwind the conference was this year. Getting up and speaking in front of everyone was incredibly nerve-racking, but a real honor. I'm working on posting a video of my slide presentation.

What's next? I have a few shows coming up, and will be opening my Etsy store. Thanks for reading, and please stay tuned.

Over the course of the past few years, I have been experimenting with different ways of decorating my work. Recently, I've been working with a motif that is an abstraction of geometric shapes that are greatly influenced by architecture and design. I have started to notice that most of my favorite shapes, the ones that I have the tendency to repeat the most, looked like the cross-section of jumps found in sports like snowboarding, biking, skateboarding, etc. So I've gone with it, and now started to draw these jump parks.

All that's missing are the athletes. I would like to thank all the Greek potters, from a long long time ago, for providing me some of my favorite art history ever. So, putting athletes on pots is not a new idea, but I am going to try and bring it up to contemporary speed. So instead of an Olympian throwing a spear, I will have Terje Haakonsen boosting 150' out of a quarter pipe throwing the largest Haakonflip ever imagined. Instead of the discus thrower,  Shawn White 80' out of the pipe throwing a quad-cork. I've decided these drawings don't  have to be confined to a documentation of what's already happened in real life. They can depict what riders imagine could happen; " _{if they were invincible, had perfect conditions, and could just get enough speed into the takeoff"}. I am really trying to concentrate on making the pots with this new porcelain paste stuff, and 15 other things as well. So its Nicole who is really coming through in the clutch, in donating her time and madskillz to getting the digital work going for the decals.

So, with a little luck and a lotta work, I should have the new cups for NCECA.

This cup is the start of a collaboration between me and Jeff Campana. Jeff's studio is right across the hall from mine here at the Bray, and we have been discussing some possibilities about mingling our processes.

We started with a simple enough step, using one of my molds, and some slip that Jeff already had mixed of his claybody, he poured  a cup and took it through his process of dissection/reassembly and glazing. That's the cup in the picture. In another test in the same kiln, he also found out that his glazes fit my clay body.

With so many similarities in our materials, and immediately finding some technical success, we're going to push on and see what we can come up with.

There is also another, larger, more theoretical point to doing this. Beyond doing it just to see if we can (which would be reason enough), or just to see how it will change us (another completely valid reason), I feel this type of searching is part of why we are both at the Bray. This type of thing is why our studios are in the same hallway, and its our job to take this opportunity to its fullest potential.

Stay tuned, more to come soon.

MudFire has really done a fantastic job with presenting the show. They also did some original writing about my work, which I very much appreciate. Here is a blurb, hope you enjoy the show...

"Nicholas Bivins is on an aesthetic quest for a personal definition of perfection in his studio pottery. He is exploring a tension between being handmade and looking handmade, between a geometric precision and evidence of the hand.

Nick's show includes a few of his signature sets, as well as individual functional pieces such as cups, pourers, bottles and more. His minimalist designs are intended to help studio pottery continue forward as relevant in our contemporary society."

First off, a solo show at MudFire Gallery in Decatur GA, called Pursuing Perfection. I couldn't be happier with all the effort that Mudfire (thank you Erik and Luba!) has put in to this show for me. They have dome some really fantastic writing as well, and that seems to be a rarity these days. I put in 28 pieces total, that includes 2 sets. Prices span the range from the high end at $720 for Toasting Cups (8), to the low end of $38 for a Liquor Cup. Please follow the links above to see the show.

Secondly, I am part of Cups and Coffee at the The Clay Studio in Philadelphia. Here is a link to my page. I generally don't release too many of these types of cups because they are such a main component to the sets I make and I don't want to become a cup making machine, but this show was just too perfect of a fit not too. I also included a new piece, called "Brew", which is a pour over filter, cup, and saucer set. Here is the announcement to the show...

Finally, to close out this post, on the show horizon are the Strictly Functional Pottery National, and the New Sales Gallery Artists Preview at Northern Clay Center. Stay tuned.

Some images of the layout, and a few of the finished pieces...

In receiving the Fellowship, I felt I had a responsibility to honor the opportunity I was being provided. I was given the time, facility, community, and funds to further develop my work. So I really tried to run with it, and push as hard as possible. This push is what lead me to start working with the CNC-Router, Automotive Paint, and now Rubber. Its my hope that all of this effort is visible in the work on display.

I've discussed the CNC/Auto Paint process in prior posts, so I won't go in to that now. The use of Rubber is the latest development, and all of the pieces in the show have it. Here are a few birds-eye view shots...

Casting Silicone Rubber into the recesses where the pots fit is my effort towards taking the function of the trays as far as possible. The rubber isn't visible when all the pots are in place, but once a piece is removed, the colored rubber is revealed. When the pot is returned to its home, the feeling on how the pot meets the tray is very smooth and cushioned.

I've expanded upon the observation of what it feels like to return a pot to its place in the tray, with how the entire tray meets the pedestal/table it is set upon. I'm doing this by casting the feet on the underside of the tray out of a Urethane Rubber. I switched to using Urethane Rubber because my supplier, Smooth-On, recommended it for durability. The Urethane Rubber is a Shore Harness of 30, which means very soft. Its a little hard to see, but in the detail photo below you can see how the foot compresses just a little bit under the weight of the tray.

The end result is that the trays become self-leveling, with never rock, and will not slide. Its also a very similar feeling to how the entire tray lands on a surface as compared to how it feels to replace a pot in its recess.

And finally, as part of the show the Bray published a full-color catalog. Susannah Israel was brought in to serve as the Jental Critic. She interviewed all five of the Fellowship artists, and then responded with this splendid essay.

Bivins Fellowship Essay by S Isreal.

So that's the Fellowship Show. The show will be up at the Bray until September 10th, hope you can stop by to see it.