Hot Out of The Kiln

It’s been awhile but life got in the way and I didn’t have time to play.

I decided to cast jewelry for next season so here are the first experiments, not cleaned up or fire polished yet but they look good if I do say so myself.

Notice there are 2 belt buckles that came out particularly nice. I’ll take some individual photos later.

Also out of that firing several pieces of Our Town and Company Houses and the head of the pit.

Here is a picture of a typical Company House

Here’s a picture of the pit head from many years ago. The rail line carried men to and from the Deeps and hauled the coal out. Some of our mines were 7 miles out under the Atlantic Ocean.

In my grandparents time and before they used horses under ground.

Both men and horses didn’t manage to grow tall and strong. The men usually went under as boys and worked until they retired. While searching for these pictures I was once again reminded of the tough life a miner’s life was and how true the song “Owe my Soul to the Company Store” was.

This piece comes from the Miner’s Museum in Glace Bay, NS

“In March of 1925, Cape Breton coal miners were receiving $3.65 in daily wages and had been working part-time for more than three years. They burned company coal to heat company houses illuminated by company electricity. Their families drank company water, were indebted to the company store and were financially destitute. Local clergy spoke of children clothed in flour sacks and dying of starvation from the infamous “four cent meal”….

In the early days of 1925, “The Company”added insult to injury by eliminating credit for miners at the company store and further reducing days of work at the collieries…

The next two months were filled with grief and hardship; Besco cut off the sale of coal to miners houses and mounted a vigorous public relations campaign to blame the miners for their own predicament. The UMWA lobbied for intervention from the Liberal Provincial and Federal governments to no avail; this prompted the union’s most difficult decision to date. On June 3, 1925, the UMWA withdrew the last maintenance men from Besco’s power plant at Waterford Lake. (Doing this would have resulted in the mines filling with water) In retaliation, the company cut off electricity and water to the Town of New Waterford, which included the hospital filled with extremely sick children…

On June 11, 1925, drunken company police charged down Plummer Avenue on horseback, beating all who stood in their path. They rode through the schoolyards, knocking down innocent children while joking that the miners were at home hiding under their beds. It was the last straw…

Riots resulted with one miner William Davis being shot and killed

The miners’ reaction was swift and decisive. They swarmed the power plant, overpowered the company police and marched them off to the town jail. For several nights afterward, the coal towns were under a state of siege by the miners. They raided the company stores to feed their starving families and then burned the stores to the ground to eliminate the last symbol of corporate greed and servitude in the Cape Breton coalfields. The company stores never re-opened after the coal wars of 1925.

The history of mine workers is filled with memories of class struggle and of brotherhood. It is summed up in the words of former District 26 President Stephen J. Drake – “There is no finer person on this planet than the working man who carries his lunch can deep into the bowels of the earth. Far beneath the ocean he works the black seam an endless ribbon of steel his only link to fresh air and blue skies. The steel rails symbolize a miners’ life, half buried underground, half reaching toward his final reward…”

Long story maybe for a blog but sometimes needs to be said again.

Other Our Town pieces

 

Technorati Tags: Our Town series,Fused Glass,Home Decor,Cape Breton Mines,Company Houses,Glace Bay Miner's Museum,Cape Breton Island

Kiln Gods Weren’t Smiling This Past Weekend

I decided to fuse a piece of glass that I really liked and turn it into a lamp shade. Needless to say it was the only piece I had.

Really is nice, this is the back and I just have it sitting in a stand to hold it.

This is the front. Don’t ya just love those bubbles in the center,especially the large one.

Also made several other pieces. Another piece of Our Town Series

A few small bubbles in this but that is common in fusing. Done on clear with transparent pieces of glass for the houses.

And 2 pieces that will probably become clocks.

 

Not all the weekend was bad however, spent several days in River Bennett with Shari,lots of relaxing time and great friends.

Also went to Cheticamp and stopped along the way for some pictures.

  It was a warm sunny day so a few minutes along the ocean was justified. This is the shore at Belle Cote. Can’t imagine the wind here in the winter. This poor house has to get the brunt of high winds.

Will try again tomorrow for more pieces and figure out what kind of offerings I need to appease the kiln gods.

Flickr Tags: fused glass,Our Town Series,Our Town,lamp shade,Cape Breton,Cheticamp,home decor,kiln fired,fused glass clocks

February Challenge

Even though I haven’t posted for the week I have been busy working on the business. The last 3 days and the next 16 or so are going to be tough as I am a great winter Olympics fan. It certainly doesn’t hurt that it is in Canada either, except the other side of the country and late hours for me.

However back to the challenge. Here are some pictures of some items done this week

Large piece within the series started last week. Colours get added and dropped depending what I am working on.

Also carried it through to some night lights

They look good plugged in with the light shinning through. You can see the different sizes of glass used and the texture on these are great.

And last but not least pieces for our town series that also will be made into night lights. These are fresh from the kiln in these photos and still have some fibre powder on them but look good.

These are my accomplishments this week. Also am working on a new computer program for artists. It is being developed by a company in the States and Jim  has very graciously allowed me to participate in the testing. So I have started populating it yesterday. It will be amazing once I get the info in.

Flickr Tags: Fused glass,fused glass houses,fused glass night lights,fused glass framed pictures,Caper Glass Creations,Olympics,home decor,Our Town series,Our town series

Today’s Project- “the Pier” fused glass streetscape

Was off to the Cape Breton Center for Craft and Design this morning for the opening of an exhibit called “up Home” It was there that the finished piece was given to it’s owner.

She grew up in the Pier, officially known as Whitney Pier and locally known as the Pier. She liked the bright colours and the reminders of our childhood when there was a diner and banks and Archie’s open and thriving.

 

  Here we have a bank, Moraff’s Yarns(still open), a fish and chip diner(we couldn’t remember the name) It is one of those things that will wake you up at 3 am because you remember it then. And of course Archie’s Dry Goods store. The church being one of many in the small community has family ties and it is St. Philip’s African Orthodox Church.

Hope she has as much enjoyment seeing it as I had making it.

Flickr Tags: Fused glass,fused glass panels,home decor,Our Town series,Our Town

February Project

I have decided to take my friend Janet up on her challenge. http://scarfaday.blogspot.com/

I will work everyday in February except for weekends either at the kiln or finishing projects from the kiln.

Hopefully this will kick start me in the right direction for the season.

So I started today and have several pieces in the kiln. One is the second firing of a panel I want to give tomorrow. Nothing like cutting it close. The worst is I usually do these in one firing and not sure why this time I decided to do it in stages. Hope it works, I slowed down the ramp up times as well as holding longer at the annealing time. Keep the fingers crossed.

Also have my first attempt at a mirror frame in the kiln. As well as 4 other pieces that are simply experimental getting ready for some frit painting.

 

As well I will shortly finish a piece I worked on yesterday. Will post a picture later.

Flickr Tags: February project,fused glass,fused glass panels,fused glass frit painting

More of Our Town Series

This one is called Main Street, Our Town. We have some shoes, crafts, gifts a mall and of course clothes. And you can’t have a Main Street that isn’t paved in gold.

This is 2 houses in Our Town series, perhaps mine and grandma’s.

Away for a few minutes to what I call “The Tree of Life”. The leaves are a moss green while the earth and branches are a bronze powder with dichroic accents.

And we are back to the changing of the colours so can’t have that without “Falling Leaves”

Back to Our Town, this is simply our house, You can see in the picture below that I put an easel back on it to allow it to stand or be hung.

And last but not least, a

night light in the series with the automatic censor, so it comes on as it gets dark, great for bathrooms or hallways.

Technorati Tags: Fused glass,Home Decor,Our Town series,Our Town,Main Street,fused glass night lights,Tree of Life,fused glass Tree of Life,Fused glass houses