Monday, December 26, 2011

American Craft Dec/Jan 2012

yay! the article Julie Hanus wrote about my work is on the news stands! i love that ron swanson is on the cover - i'm a parks and rec fan...here is the article online: Product Placement: Connect the Dots by julie hanus
la la la la.
(get it? pee wee reference - couldn't help myself.)

the opening paragraph...
It's easy to get drawn into Meredith Host's cheerful Dot Dot Dash dinnerware. Patterns fluctuate and recur in layers blooming with luscious color: turquoise washes, apricot polka dots, chartreuse bands. The effect - riotous yet refined, citrus-fresh yet almost familiar - invites the eye to linger.

Sunday, November 27, 2011

foldedpigs at the Renegade Craft Fair


it's that time again - renegade here i come!
foldedpigs will have a booth this upcoming weekend in chicago. i'm located in one of the rooms upstairs at the pulaski park fieldhouse.


Monday, November 14, 2011

OPEN STUDIO EVENT!

we're having an open studio sale!
stop by and have a snack while you shop for great gifts from:
Meredith Host : Rain Harris : Paul Donnelly
foldedpigs dinnerware : lusterbunny jewelry

there will be great sales on our work as well as on quality seconds! just in time for the holidays!


meredith host:


rain harris:

paul donnelly:

foldedpigs dinnerware:
lusterbunny jewelry:
ALLSMAN BUILDING
708 E 31st Street, KCMO 64109
friday: 5:30-8p
saturday: 10-4pm

Monday, November 7, 2011

Tuesday, November 1, 2011

by the power of greyskull

it's that time of the year again...the obligatory halloween post:
HE-MAN HALLOWEEN!

for a few years now i've wanted to get a group together to be he-man characters. i claimed teela - the head of the royal army and had 2 others join my crew: he-man & the sorceress.

first off...reference photos...
teela. action figure & cartoon. i went for a hybrid of both.
the sorceress & he-man.i was quite proud of myself to have busted out my sewing machine that i don't know how to use. my roommate kelley gave me a tutorial, and holy craft! i sewed! he-man & battlecat over saw the process.
i built teela's snake battle gear out of cardboard & duct tape. i saved a bunch of toilet paper & paper towel rolls to make the cobra staff and edging on the armor.
a couple of crafternoons later and here we are...
miss amelia as the sorceress, me as teela, and miss whitney as he-man himself.
snake battle gear.

Sunday, October 30, 2011

fevere bread bowl

why lookie here... one of my shallow bowls is now the olive oil bowl for bread samples at Fevere Bakery.
if you're in Kansas City and you haven't tried fevere bread - well then, you're missing out - get to it! i used to eat their delicious breads until i found out i was celiac. :( now i just enjoy the smell of them.

Friday, October 21, 2011

Heck Yes Craft

julie k hanus of American Craft Magazine posted a "Heck Yes Craft" blog post about my work today! totally rad! it's a precursor to the article she wrote about my work that will be in the december/january issue.



from the American Craft website:
Heck Yes Craft is a series of visual blog posts with a simple mission: to show off amazing work. Come back every Friday for more.

Sunday, October 9, 2011

watershed: tumblers

while at watershed this summer, i threw a few tumblers with the watershed clay body. memories of working with this clay while making my 2005 salad days plates came flooding back. there are little bits (sometimes big bits) of "magic" (aka rocks) in the terracotta. i quickly remembered why i press molded the 500 salad plates and did not throw them. after making these 6 cups, i switched to hand building.

the tumblers in the greenware state. the iron in the clay is green, but fires red.
the tumblers fired. i'll going to further investigate a darker color palette.

i love the orange-red color of the unglazed clay.
the bright orange specks are embedded glaze in the divots where i dug out the "magic" bits.


Friday, September 16, 2011

BRIGHT.

the work i sent to the Schaller Gallery is in a show called "BRIGHT" featuring renee brown, arthur halvorsen, & myself. it's up from september 4th - 20th.

also here's my new artist page on the gallery's site.

Monday, September 5, 2011

foldedpigs at the Renegade Craft Fair

once again i will be vending at renegade craft fair with my foldedpigs ware in chicago next weekend! i'm booth #125, on division street, between Wood & Paulina.

keeping my fingers crossed for a rain-free weekend.

Saturday, August 27, 2011

cup board, mugs, & tumblers, oh my!

as a maker of objects, i am also a collector of objects. this will be the first of my collection posts - so watch out for more soon.

first up: CUPS!

this cup board has been a project in the works for awhile - now it's finished with the help of the amazing paul donnelly. it's mounted in my kitchen and looks lovely if i do say so myself.

cup placement will change as the collection grows.
if building your own cup board and you plan on painting it...one suggestion: paint all the boards before assembling and once it's put together just touch up paint. getting this sucker painted was the BIGGEST thorn in my side.

Saturday, August 20, 2011

collaborating is fun!

i made some work at watershed BUT, i really just wanted to decorate... which spawned a couple collaborations to take place. here's the first project. it started with dylan beck finding a couple objects from watershed's factory. he built 3 box like structures to fit into one of the objects.
now here's where i come in... DECORATING TIME.
i chose to use the Dot Dot Doily pattern from my collection. i was debating between this and another pattern - but on a trip to town we stopped at a church basement/rummage sale. their bathroom had the Dot Dot Doily pattern for their paper towels, so i took it as a sign.
after all 3 were decorated - assembly started.
glazing. team work is key people.collaborating is fun!after once firing. i love the reddish orange of the watershed brick clay.the finished piece.this piece is now on display at ann street gallery in newburgh, ny as part of the exhibition: Breaking Boundaries: A Survey of Contemporary Ceramics

Tuesday, August 16, 2011

WATERSHED!


i spent the last two weeks at watershed and had a BLAST!queen anne's lace in full effect on the way down to the factory.

not only did i get to go swimming, jump off rocks, drink my favorite root beer, eat ice cream, go on nature walks, and hang out with an awesome group...i also made some stuff in the studio! more posts to follow.

Thursday, July 21, 2011

RIC RAC ROUNDUP!

it's that time of year again when i start peddling my foldedpigs ware at craft fairs!

this saturday 9am-4pm i'll be set up at the RIC RAC ROUNDUP!
here's a little blurb on the news featuring foldedpigs. oo la la!

Friday, July 8, 2011

the thrill of the hunt

i hunt for taxidermy - it's not the real hunting part - i let others do that for me. i just hunt for the mounts they want to get rid of! soon i will post my collection, most of it resides in my dining room.
for the 2nd year in a row i attended a taxidermy auction in mid-missouri. it's quite an extensive auction from many private collections around the country.

an impressive spread indeed!

i went to the auction with the goal is bringing some smaller mounts home. smaller like these little duikers, steinbucks, dik diks, and oribi.
i would love love love a warthog but the bidding gets a little too rich for my blood. maybe one day.here's a quick video of the auction process - bidding is for a pheasant.



my winnings this year included a giant kudu. i really didn't consider his size and i'm honestly not sure i can fit him in my house. i meant to only bid on smaller mounts but, well, i have always wanted a kudu.the other 3 mounts that i brought home: steinbuck, duiker & black bear.soon i'll share pictures of the entire collection. i now have 29 mounts...mostly shoulder, but a few full body mounts.


Monday, July 4, 2011

making, packing, shipping

more making & shipping has been happening in the summer heat. it's been a little rough in the non-air conditioned studio, but the show must go on!

hostware shipped to lillstreet art center in chicago, il
work shipped to schaller gallery in st joseph, mi
a close up of the batch headed to watershed's salad days pottery sale in maine
these are headed to the museum shop at the elmhurst art museum in elmhurst, il
and last but not least these settings went to art & light gallery in san diego, caa detail of the settings


Thursday, June 9, 2011

new galleries!

so far it's been a busy summer...makin' makin' makin'...
and after the making is done, it's time for the shipping!


this batch of hostware headed to Imagine in skaneateles, ny.

this batch shipped off to Red Lodge Clay Center in red lodge, mt.


red lodge already photographed all the work and has it up on their website....everything looks awesome!
check it out here.


Tuesday, June 7, 2011

KCArtistLink artist profile

my friend Blair Schulman wrote an artist profile for me to post on KCArtistLink.
KCArtistLink connects kansas city artists to resources and opportunities that help market their work and strengthen their artistic practice.
i'm happy to be a part of the Art Notes artist profile section! see it here...
but here's also a copied/pasted version. a big thanks to blair!!!

In addition to practicality, toilet paper and paper towels bear the motifs we want in our everyday lives. Meredith Host has been collecting these patterns of domesticity for over ten years. Fresh off the roll, they're attractive enough for consumer placement in kitchens and bathrooms. Although these items perform unseemly tasks, Host simply improves on their ephemeral ideal by reintroducing them into something more permanent.

Host derives a certain humor from the reaction of the user when they find out they're using a plate adorned in toilet paper designs. Her forms are deliberately minimal while the approach to surface decoration is "more is more." The surface patterns she uses have a familiarity because of their occurrence in the paper products we use daily, but Host says, most admirers can't quite place where they come from. But she finds a certain satisfaction when her work is used in the home, fulfilling a "functional destiny."

Raised in an art-friendly family in Detroit, it seemed inevitable that Meredith would figure out one discipline or another. During middle school, she started working with clay and "ceramics became the thing I couldn't live without." Hence, the usual succession of events...

A BFA in Ceramics at the Kansas City Art Institute, Host attended a stream of residencies that included School for American Crafts at Rochester Institute of Technology in Rochester, NY. Watershed Center for Ceramic Arts in Newcastle, ME, and Belden Brick Factory residency in Sugarcreek, OH, eventually earning an MFA in Ceramics at Ohio State University.

Okay, enough education, it was time to put all this practice into process and Host moved back to Kansas City to start up a studio. The decision was easy for Host – KC is an affordable place to live and has a supportive art community. She works full-time in a studio shared with ceramic sculptor and installation artist Rain Harris.

Host has two lines – Meredith Host - thrown porcelain functional artwork that goes to galleries and exhibitions. foldedpigs is her commercial line of repurposed restaurant ware which is sold online, independent crafts shows and wholesaled to shops and boutiques around the country.

Employing creative trickery in her pieces, Host enjoys unsuspecting customers using her work and making unnerving discoveries in their design. The idea of food preparation and its eventual expulsion incorporated into their vessels imparts a somewhat topsy-turvy psych-out.

Perhaps the most surprising/engaging/gross element is her foldedpigs cockroach design – at once both disgusting and intriguing. It's the idea of taking something that is otherwise disgusting and cause for panicked extermination, then deciding to put it directly on the dining room table.

Vous ĂȘtes ce que vous mangez?

Her last series of work, Residue, are white on white dinnerware imbued with subtle contaminants on the surface that are intended to tease or torment the user. In the darker humor realm, Host creates a psychological response that lingers with the user. The most effective of the Residue ware seems to be the single stray hair, but Hosts personal favorite contaminants were the mouse droppings.

In addition to the concept of squalor, fabric design is another inspirational source. The vintage and contemporary designs of Marimekko to more recent designers like Orla Kiely, Amy Butler, and Joel Dewberry. A big fan of the culture-vulture Japanese fashion magazine, Fruits, Host looks for the mish-mash of color and pattern of teenagers vamping in the Harajuku shopping district. Like examining a wall chock full of Wayne Thiebaud paintings, she likes the bright, saturated gumball colors that appeals to her sweet tooth.

Decorating is really a balancing act; she plays around with asymmetry in color and pattern on symmetrical forms to create dynamic surfaces. The depth of her surfaces comes from using stenciling, thermofax screen-printing, and iron oxide decal processes.

From a practical standpoint, her work is fairly sellable; but is also getting into exhibitions and galleries as collectable pieces. Host recently received an emerging artist award through NCECA (National Council on Education for the Ceramic Arts) and also Ceramics Monthly Magazine.

Thinking about how much time she actually spends making her work, Host realizes her hourly work rate is pathetic. She's "hit the ceiling on how much I can currently charge for each piece. Unfortunately, the functional ceramic market has an established price range for particular items, and I'm pretty sure that this is something I cannot change."

Create and ship, create and ship, like the label says, repeat as necessary, but Host hopes to expand her presence in ceramic galleries around the country. With foldedpigs, she will be selling at Bon Bon Atelier's Ric Rac Roundup in Westport (Kansas City) this summer and Renegade Craft Fair in Chicago this September and December.

Looking ahead, she has begun a search to find a building/commercial space to start a studio with friends and fellow ceramic artists, Rain Harris and Paul Donnelly.

Host would like to start designing fabrics that will compliment her dishes. She is also working on her vegetable garden as well as adding to a growing taxidermy collection.

Looking for the beauty in something otherwise unattractive or disgusting, Host sparks an interest in making friends and living with the elements we prefer to turn our backs on.

Written by Blair Schulman, 2011




Monday, May 23, 2011

Small Favors VI

i was invited to participate in this years Small Favors VI at The Clay Studio in philly. this post is a little late as the show came down yesterday...but here's a pic of my little yunomi in the show as well as my last year's submission. all the work in the show must fit into a 4" x 4" x 4" plexiglas cube.dot dot pinwheel yunomi
(i wish you could see the interior - it's a lovely lime green)
dot dot doily espresso cup from Small Favors V

Friday, May 20, 2011

NMoCA

i'm happy to say that my work can now be found in the Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art's Museum Store in overland park, ks. thanks to whitney for snapping pics of the display!