Mimi Torchia Boothby

Besides doing a painting a day this month, I am spending almost every day at the pottery studio in Seward Park. I have taken over 300 pounds of clay in the last year and turned most of it into dinnerware. That’s right, mugs, bowls, casseroles. I am a better painter than potter, the learning curve is slow and arduous, but it gives me a challenge, an outlet, and a place to hang out with other people. Most people who have been in my house in the last year have left with a token of my ceramics class. This here, though, no one has walked out with, because it is my favorite mug. It is a white clay body that I painted over with iron oxide. Then I carved curliques all over it. Next, it was painted over with a “carbon trap” glaze and put into a hotter than 2000 degrees kiln. Where there was iron, it turned wonderful colors. Where there was no iron, it stayed whitish. And that is my painting for today!