Art by Fuzzy

Pottery, Photography, Design - Brandon "Fuzzy" Schwartz

Summer Pots: Finished and For Sale

About half a year ago I posted an image of some pottery that I was working on.  I finally finished that batch of pots and shot some photos a few weeks ago.  I literally had to dust off my photo booth since it had been so long since I photographed pottery.  So I’ve been busy…  Here’s what I came up with:

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Murals at West Noble Primary

Giving Tree - West Noble Primary

Giving Tree in the Hallway

Over the summer another teacher and I were commissioned to paint murals at West Noble Primary.  The school, formerly known as Ligonier Elementary, was becoming a K-1 building as part of the plan to realign the elementary schools in our corporation.  The principal wanted all the old dog-themed murals replaced with Little Chargers.  So Carol and I set out to transform the school before the end of summer.  Carol is quite an illustrator and had already come up with a Little Chargers logo last school year.  It is a cartoon of a boy and a girl in knight armor holding lightning bolts… so that was where we started. [Read more…]

Summer and Fall 2011

Cutting the Cord

Cutting the Cord

Well, according to the time-stamp on my last post, I haven’t posted in nearly 6 months!  Half of a year…  There have been a few changes since then.  First and most importantly my wife and I are now parents.  Quincy Blue was born August 12th.  At first we spent a lot of time driving to the hospital, doctor’s office and medical supply store but now everyone is doing very well.  The only problem so far is that Quin hasn’t learned to type yet so she can’t update my blog for me.  She also doesn’t have enough experience in the clay studio to be a proper apprentice and attach handles to mugs, reclaim clay or mop the floor.  So I’ve had to do all of that sort of thing myself (as you can see from the lack of blog posts).  Luckily my wife let me spend a good amount of time in the studio recently to finish some commissioned pieces and Christmas items.  (She wasn’t exactly thrilled to take care of the kid while I got all dirty but I guess I’ll count it as my Christmas present.)  I just bisque fired everything last night so I hope to start glazing later today or tomorrow.

Mural in Progress

Mural in Progress

The new school year started a few months ago.  As previously mentioned, I’m back at West Noble Primary, formerly known as Ligonier Elementary.  We are now a Kindergarten and 1st Grade building while the other elementary school has grades 2-4.  The “Boss” wanted a new look to go with the new staff and building name so he hired another teacher and myself to paint new murals all over the school.  It was a huge project.  My wife, again, wasn’t exactly thrilled that I was off painting while she was 9 months pregnant.  But she is the best.  I finished all but two of my murals before the kid arrived and then finished the last two in November.  More details will follow in a later post.

As for this site, it seems to have been forgotten.  But that’s not true!  I’ve been working on it behind the scenes a little bit at a time.  I moved the site to a new host as an add-on domain.  (Use StableHost by clicking this link to help support my endeavors.)  I’ve tweaked the Basic Gray theme for the blog and I’ve added content to the process, studio, and artist pages.  There aren’t a lot of images yet, and the gallery isn’t up (which, I suppose, is ironic for a visual artist’s website).  But there will be images.  My goal is before 2012.

Clay Blog Review

Clay Blog Review

I’ve also spent a little time working on a web project: Pottery Making Info.  I’ve started a new series of posts called Clay Blog Review which highlights some of the best pottery related blog posts of the month.  Take a look at the top pottery posts of November.  I have a few posts lined up for December and hopefully another Blogs of the Year post over Christmas break.

Other than all that, a few T-shirt designs, another website, painting large cartoons of half a basketball team, changing a few diapers and coaching cross country it’s been pretty boring for the past 6 months.  I’m hoping to add some more detailed posts about recent projects soon.  And announce some big news…  Stay tuned.

Drying: plates, mugs, vases

mugs, set of plates drying

mugs, set of plates drying

I’ve had a chance to spend a few hours in the clay studio over the past few weeks.  I threw a set of simple plates for my wife.  The only other set that I’ve thrown were part of my senior exhibit in college 7 years ago.  I’ve thrown a plate or platter every once in a while, to remember how to do it or so I have a large flat area to do something fancy with glazes, so I think I’ve improved slightly since then.  I’ll reserve judgement until after they are all glazed and fired to see how they hold up, and how they stack, and if I like the functionality of the set.  I threw 9 total.  They are all pretty similar in size but as I was trimming the bottom it was interesting to see the slight differences along the outside edges.  I also tried a few root beer mugs (or beer steins, depending on your choice of beverage).  I think I started with about two pounds of clay and added some thick handles with thumb rests.

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Summer Break: 2011

Well, I finally made it to summer break.  The end of the school year went pretty well.  We finished up the track season by taking third at the conference meet.  I spent the past school year at West Noble Elementary instead of Ligonier Elementary where I’ve been teaching since 2004.  Now I’ll be going back to Ligonier Elementary for the next school year but things will be different.  The two elementary schools are re-aligning into a K-1 building and a 2-4 building.  Which means that half of the teachers are switching buildings.  Which means a lot of moving!  The good thing about changing jobs and locations often is that I don’t have 20 years worth of stuff to move like some of the other teachers.

I do plan to spend a lot of time at Ligonier Elementary this summer, but not to move boxes.  The Ligonier Elementary era has come to an end so the West Noble Primary era can begin.  A new name, new staff, and new mascot means a new look.  So I’ll be working with another teacher to cover the walls with murals that have less to do with dogs and more to do with Little Chargers.  Currently we’re working on sketching out some ideas.

I’ve also been spending a good chunk of this week in the clay studio.  But now I’m going to the library with my wife.  Updates on murals and pottery should follow.