Artstock spotlight: Paula West Pottery
Posted September 27, 2010 at 12:45 pm by Peggy Sue McRae
Paula welcomes you to her studio this coming weekend for Artstock...photo by Peggy Sue McRae
With Artstock coming up I took a drive out to the west side of the Island to visit Paula West at her studio on MacGinitie Road. Paula’s studio will be open to visitors during Artstock the first weekend in October. If you’ve never seen Paula’s studio this is an opportunity well worth taking advantage of.
Paula works full time in her studio. She was busy creating patterns on a collection of cups when I arrived. I asked her what inspires her. She talked about the beauty of everyday objects and the inspiration she gets from folk arts, quilts, her garden and tribal crafts. She showed me a technique she was using called “sgraffito.”
Sgraffito is Italian for “to scratch” and was a popular ceramic technique in Italy during the Renaisance. Paula uses this technique to create patterns on cups by “scratching” through layers of slip. Here is what sgraffito looks like (below). To see the finished product plan to drop by Paula’s Studio between 10-4:30 on October 2nd and 3rd.
Sgraffito, with Paula West...photos by Peggy Sue McRae
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