Yimeng Ou: May 2015

Apart from the biggest universe bubble aquarium, I am going to make other smaller bubbles floating around it. The following two works are middle sizes, with landscape setting inside. Other smaller bubbles are only spheres.

For these two works, I will introduce plants and lighting, but no glass in the front or water inside.

1. Cave

The following images show the inspiration and the sketch. The triangular forms in the middle have the same origin as the mountain like forms in the biggest tank, which are parallel universes or worlds. What different is that the forms are minerals in this world. The locals collect this kind of minerals as their clothes and portable houses.

There is a gap between the minerals and the sphere that I can hide some small lights inside the gap.

2. Forest

Before I changed my design from a big square tank where every setting is one the same surface to several sphere tanks, I only planned to have one landform, which is desert. But rethinking about it now, I found it could increase some diversity to my work by introducing some other landforms. That is why I have the cave and the forest. In the future, if I have time, I might design more.

The following images show the inspiration and the sketches.

To enrich this piece, I want to plant some flytraps. I found there were various flytraps in the Chelsea Flower Show. They looked absolutely astonishing and alien, which are suitable to my fantasy landscape. I got a flyer from the flytrap nursery that they can deliver the planted plants in one day.

The flytraps will be planted underneath the ceramic piece inside the sphere, and grow through the holes. I am looking forward to glazing them, and finishing the setting.

I picked some of the results from glaze test 5 and applied them to the first group of universe bubbles I made. I want to see how the glazes appear on spheres in different sizes.

Glazes:

Top side: COS1+2( A: BOS11, B:12, C:13/14)

Bottom side: 13, 14, little 17 on 14

(BOTZ 11: Ice Crystal, 12: Bright Blue 13: Indigo 14: Deep Blue, 17: Tenmoku)

Matt

The image shows the comparison between the rest of test 5 and 6.
From left to right: 11, 12, 13, 14.
Top left: COS2

The image shows the comparison between the rest of test 5 and 6.
From left to right: 13, 17 on14

Glazes:

COS 2( A:11, B:12, C: 14)

(BOTZ 11: Ice Crystal, 12: Bright Blue, 14: Deep Blue)

Glossy

In the follow image, the white spots came from 11, the bright blue was from 12, and the dark greenish blue was from 14.

Glazes:

COS 2( A:11, B:12, C: 14)

(BOTZ 11: Ice Crystal, 12: Bright Blue, 14: Deep Blue)

Glossy

There is too much brown on this piece, which I feel not satisfied. I think when 14 is too thin, it appear to be brown.

As shown in the image blow, the glazes on these two pieces are the same. But they look quite different. I prefer the colour on the left, but the white spots on the second one are more close to my design. They are smaller, more like stars. However, there is too much green on this glaze combination that the pieces are more like ocean rather than the universe. The first bubble showed on this page share the same problem, even more like coral reef or lands surrounded by the sea.

The image shows the comparison between the rest of test 5 and 6.
From left to right: 11, 12, 14, COS 2

Glazes:

A: BOS 11

B: 12, 13, 14, 16

(BOTZ 11: Ice Crystal, 12: Bright Blue, 13: Indigo, 14: Deep Blue, 16: Lilac Speckle)

Matt

BOS11 almost melt with BOS16, unable to be seen. However, apart from this, the overall colour pattern has a feeling of the universe. I only applied a thin layer of BOS16, so it remains black rather than the light purple.

The image shows the comparison between the rest of test 5 and 6.
From top to bottom: BOS14, 13, 12, 16

Glazes:

12, 14

(BOTZ 12: Bright Blue, 14: Deep Blue)

glossy

Lovely glossy colour, which can be used on some small objects to adjust the atmosphere of the work.

The image shows the comparison between the rest of test 5 and 6.
From left to right: 12, 14

6. Random mixed glazes

From BOS, lost tracking.

Glazes:

BOS16

Glazes:

Surface:

A: 11

B: overlaid 9, 12, 13, 15

Lid:

A:11

B: 12, 13, 15

Inside:

Base: 14

On top: from bottom to top - 11, 16, 12, 13, 15

( 9: Mayco Amber, BOTZ 11: Ice Crystal, 12: Bright Blue, 13: Indigo, 14: Deep Blue, 15: Black Blue, 16: Lilac Speckle)

I painted some blue liquid borrowed from Yuta, which can stop the glazes stick the lid and the body together.

This piece was made for testing whether I can build the sphere on top of a two layer template which can help me get a flat front surface to fit the glass. I want to make sure that the template can be taken out afterwards and the glass can be fit in.

I quite like the colour of this piece, though it has a little distance away from the feeling of the universe. Its colour has a fluid beauty inside, which contains life force. I wonder with a bit more black from 9, less green from 14, it may look better.

However, the inside colour was not so good that they didn't keep the geometric pattern I painted. 11 and 16 cannot be seen. 15 was running crazily with 14.

Glazes: ASO 1+ 5/6

This is an old glaze combination. I tried it again was because I did some changes on the triangular form. I cut the round surface of the form into many triangles, to give it a feeling of graphic and geometry.

The lighter brownish colour overly ran this time. ASO5 runs more than ASO6 on top of ASO1. I didn't have enough 6, so I used some 5 as well. The colour I want is the one on the side of the work, darker with a bit of purple, not brown. The triangular surface is barely seen, but when you touch it, it feels great. Next time, either I make it more visible or there is no point of doing it if the patterns cannot be seen.