Thursday, 29 May 2014

Cherry Fold Arts Awards with Y6


So I was asked to go back to Cherry Fold Primary School after last years success of our Arts Awards banners for the school entrance celebrating Y6s journey through the school. This year the Y6s are mostly made up of a group of children I worked with along side their teacher Mrs Fisher in Y3 every Wednesday for almost a full year. We learnt a lot together looking at teaching the curriculum creatively and even had a visit from Ofsted whilst working on our Egyptian project achieving an outstanding grade when one of the boys offered the inspector his own workspace and piece of clay. This time we looked at creating a frieze using Italian Renaissance techniques of transferring the images from the designs or 'cartoons' on to the clay.

Our topic was what we were proud of Burnley for, which at the beginning a few said it was boring miss! After the first few hours of talking and drawing our favourite bits of where they lived the children had changed their opinion and were rather proud of their home town. The Frieze consists of twelve 30cm square clay tiles which join onto each other to form a continuous picture. The metre square Coat of Arms was the idea of one of the children who wanted to celebrate Burnley and the motto of the town. 

The clay will fire terracotta and the pale blue is the glaze that will melt in the firing to reveal the River Brun running through the town joining all the tiles together. 

See how many things you can identify from Burnley on the pieces there is a few missing so will reveal the full piece when fired. 












Sunday, 25 May 2014

Festival of Wonders part of the Nights at the Museum


Nights at the Museum is a national project which the Festival of Wonders is part of. Anita Burrows and I devised a project to reach the younger end of the village, Mother and Toddler group, Brownie and Guide troops and also Adults including the Friends of The Heritage Centre in Barrowford. We wanted to forge links between the Centre and Higherford Mill as we still get people coming up to us saying they never knew we were there even though Anita and I are entering our 13th year at Higherford Mill!





We visited the groups with willow and tissue intending to make a replica mill and chimney but they were more excited about our trip along the river. We settled on fish and bird life and even some tadpoles along the way. We worked with the toddlers to make simple shapes so they were easy to create in the short period of time we spent at the library in Barrowford. And larger creations were created over a couple of sessions with 
one adult returning 3 times to finish her lantern. 





The lanterns were displayed in the Barn at the Heritage Centre and collected when lit to walk along the riverbank.






At the end of the walk the participants were rewarded with cake and refreshments and a number of open studios at the mill. There was also the added bonus of Pendles' 2nd Glass Festival too.

Ceramics at the Mill

Opening night at Ceramics at the Mill 2014
Kath Bonson
Well what a weekend of lovely pots and lovely potters it was. Feedback was amazing and although visitor numbers were down from last year we had a lot of sales and a lot of really positive comments about how wonderful the show was and what talent was on display.

Kath Bonson

Helen Russell


Helen Russell

Susan Sharpe

Susan Jones

Matt Wilcox

Matt Wilcox

Anne Haworth

Anne Haworth

Mandy Dodd

Dave Horsfall

Lesley Anne Greene

Katy O'Neil

Katy O'Neil

Julie Miles

Mandy Dodd

Julie Miles

Daniel Bridge

Julie Miles

Daniel Bridge

Daniel Bridge

Julie Miles

Julie Miles before set up

Sunday, 4 May 2014

Spring 2014


So trying to rest my torn Achilles with a 5 day break looking after Charlie who has a tumour on his nerve so we were hobbling together. He's already had an MRI scan I am still waiting for mine. We walked a lot well not far but we did well and got to see the woodland springing forth in the sunshine her delights of wild flowers and also tried to catch the butterflies but they didn't stay long. We saw a Meadow Brown, Orange Tip and couple of Whites and Tortoiseshells.




























 









 I am hoping some will evolve into vases we shall see. It was a fabulous few days the weather was patchy but we didn't get wet much. Physio soon but not before the weekends festivities of Ceramics at the Mill its going to be a good show I  promise 



Workshops dates for 2020

Julie Miles Ceramics Courses for 2020     So I am launching my new workshops at long last! So if you fancy having a go, being crea...