Three left

The tribal looking rattle is taken. Only three left.

Once lost, but now found!

These were a part of my original portfolio submission to get into grad school. They are rattles about the size of a baseball. I had a bunch and thought they were all gone, but then I found a few stashed away this weekend in

the studio. I will part with these four only.

The series originally sold for $100 each. I will sell these to whomever wants them on a first come first serve basis for $45 a piece! If you are interested, just let me know.

Opinions needed!

I've decided to dive in head first, go for it and finally commit to having clay classes this summer. Things are not developed as far as I would like with the setting, but it's good and will work for now. If there is enough support this 1st summer, then the following year I can commit more cash and re-invest to make this dream grow.

So to get the ball rolling, I need some opinions on what kind of clay classes you might be interested in taking, what day during the week, day or evenings, and how frequently you would like the class to be offered.

Feel free to make any comments or suggestions here or by emailing me at mike@mikeprather.com. I'll put you on my email list and keep you updated on discounts, memberships, special offers and so on.

Here we go!

What's new?

Well, life can sure throw a curve ball when it's wants to. My mom is finally done with her chemo and is now in remission. My dad however, went into the ER two weeks ago with chest pain. He had an EKG and found out he was having a heart attack.. The gave him a catheter in his heart and they did a triple bypass. If you haven't figured it out either, I am going through a divorce as well. Although it has been pretty civil, it has also consumed my life for the last few months. Needless to say the first thing to be put aside has been the studio. I did manage to finish all the trim and the interior of the main part. All I need to door is paint the doors, trim them out and get some light and outlet covers. The position i am in now is to continue on with this dream or to scratch it all together and move into a smaller, more affordable house. It's not a decision I am making right now. I can wait a bit on it. So there it is. That's what's new.

Clay Sculptor

Philippe Faraut is the artist here. I love this guy's ability to do so much with the human face. His knowledge of bone structure, muscle structure, gender, and race is unbelievable. If your looking to learn how to work with the human form, especially the upper portion, I highly recommend his books or video.

What Happened?

It probably seems like I fell off the face of the planet. Well not really. I don't want to publish too many personal affairs so I'll just say that my life is changing significantly. I haven't stopped working on the studio and on my own work. I just haven't had the time to get here and update stuff. I did make a few small adjustments to the site. I am hoping to have some new work with a new flavor posted soon too. It is time for a change in my work.

So here is the latest with the studio. I have a little trim to do around the windows and the remodeling in the main room will be done. Then I can make some cool shelves and storage racks. This will be the fun stuff and should go rather quickly. I most definitely will be having classes this summer and maybe late spring. It won't be as elaborate as I had originally hoped, but I am OK with starting off a little small. I plan to have a schedule up in early spring on my site and will forward this information to anyone on my mailing list. If your at all interested, let me know and I will make sure your on the list. Classes will be mostly, if not all clay. I plan to have wheel throwing and hand building classes of various types. Space will also be available to use as an open studio situation as well. I am open for suggestions and would really like to hear what kind of classes you would like to take. So if you have any suggestions, let me know.

change of plans

Always something to changing my plans. The studio isn't going as planned and neither is everything I wanted to do this summer. Sometimes I wonder why I even make plans. I won't be going to Pittsburgh this week. That has changed. I won't be having classes this summer. I didn't plan on cutting up a tree for 2 1/2 weeks. I didn't plan on my mom getting this sick. I thought I was done training for races, but now I might be reconsidering that. Funny how things turn out. I've come to realize that as I get older life doesn't toss things at you but rather, life throws fast balls and curve balls directly at you. I've learned to take it all in stride and allow things to take me on a course and I can only serve as sort of a guide. In the end, life is still good and the world still goes around.