Make a beautiful flower which happens to be the state flower of Mississippi! We will provide patterns for students to cut out of prepared slabs and instruct them on how to put it all together. Firing is done here in our studio and ready to pick up in a couple of weeks. Shipping is available at additional cost.
Maximum capacity: 20 students
Time needed in the studio: 2 hours per group
Age level: Suitable for ages 12+ and all experience levels
Cost: $25 per person
Students trace patterns onto slabs of clay, then cut them out and turn them into mermaid or sea monster wind chimes. An array of bright colors are provided to decorate the pieces. They are then clear glazed and fired. Wind chimes are ready in about two weeks. Shipping is available at additional cost. This particular project includes the rope needed to connect the pieces of your mermaid for hanging. Assembly is easy and done at home.
Maximum capacity: 20 students
Time needed in the studio: 2 hours per group
Age level: Suitable for ages 12 and up and all experience levels
Cost: $20 per person
Students trace templates onto clay slabs to create a mask form approximately 12” x 5”. Masks can be decorated with clay coils, beads, and other handmade embellishments. We provide an array of bright colors to paint with. A clear glaze is applied before the work is fired. Pieces are ready for pickup in two weeks. Shipping is available at additional cost. This project encourages full artistic expression and involves working with slabs, coils, molds, and glaze.
Maximum capacity: 20 students
Time needed in the studio: 2 hours maximum per group
Age level: Suitable for ages 8+ and all experience levels
Cost: $20 per person
Students receive a prepared porcelain tile approximately 6” x 6.” Designs provided by the studio or students are traced onto the tile. The design is then carved into the tile with carving tools. The result is a black and white tile that has a block printing look, suitable for display or framing. Projects are fired and ready for pickup in two weeks. Shipping is available at additional cost. This project allows participants the experience of working with tiles in a stylized approach, removing clay rather than adding it, and adapting a two dimensional design to clay.
Maximum capacity: 25 students
Time needed in the studio: One hour per group
Age level: Suitable for ages 15+ and all experience levels
Cost: $20 per person
Students work with prepared slabs of clay to form vases that are about 8” in height. We provide texture tools and molds with which students can add embellishments to their vases. The finished vases can then be painted and decorated or left to be glazed in one color by studio personnel. All work is fired in our studio and ready for pickup in two weeks. Shipping is available at additional cost. This project allows participants the experience of working with slabs of clay, adding texture, and joining pieces together.
Maximum capacity: 20 students
Time needed in the studio: 1 hour per group
Age level: Suitable for all ages and experience levels
Cost: $20 per person
Students receive a small ball of clay and instruction on how to form this into a pinched pot. Students paint their pots with ceramic slips and leave them in the studio to be clear glazed and fired. Pots are ready in about two weeks. Shipping is available at additional cost. This project allows participants the opportunity to experience clay on a basic level and to work with decorating and painting.
Maximum capacity: 25 students
Time needed in the studio: 30 minutes per group
Age level: Suitable for all ages and experience levels
Cost: $7 per person
In February of this year Paulette Dove, a local painter and art educator, taught a workshop at the Ohr on how to make a paper kiln, a technique she learned at NCECA the last time it was in New Orleans. It’s similar to a pit firing, a low and slow method that creates marks from added materials and fuming. You cover the pots in all sorts of strange stuff like banana peels, rock salt, and seaweed then wrap them in aluminum foil before you build the temporary kiln around them and fire it up. The process for the Paper Kiln was really fun and everyone was feeding off the energy.
Ever since, I’ve been wanting to add a new alternative firing process at the studio besides the raku that we can do on a regular basis. That’s where Kathleen Varnell comes in. Along with being a ceramic artist for many years, Kathleen was also the Curator at the Mississippi Museum of Art. She does a Smoke Firing in a barrel, which is similar to the paper kiln, and she was kind enough to share her process with us in the Ohr studio. You can use the aluminum foil saggar for this kind of firing, too, if you’re looking for more color. But, these are some results without adding anything but the sawdust and paper.
Barrel firing is on the very low end of the temperature spectrum for ceramics (seldom going above 1500℉,) and work is usually fired to bisque beforehand. Although this way of firing isn’t good for any sort of surface you would want to eat off of, you get some beautiful results. There’s a lot of subtlety and drama available from firing this way, and the “set it and forget it” way of firing makes it a very appealing option for finishing a pot.
Some of the oldest pottery discovered was fired similarly, and the carbon coming from the combustible material used creates effects usually only seen in nature.
We see art as a road that leads to self-reflection, creative problem solving, and social change; it creates dynamic and profound interactions that shape personal identities and strengthens our Gulf Coast community. In order to expand our impact on school children and the local community, we make great efforts to keep our admission fees, membership dues and class tuition as affordable as possible through corporate sponsorship.
We are fortunate to receive widespread support from businesses and residents of the Mississippi Gulf Coast community and beyond. Through our fundraising efforts Bubbles & Bonbons: A Galentine’s Affair and Palate to Palette: An Evening with Robert St. John & Wyatt Waters, we have raised almost $20,000 for art education initiatives for the children of our community.
