TAOS ART SCHOOL

Equine Clay Sculpture
Karen Terpstra

Summer, 2009
Tuition: $620
Lab Fee: $30

About the Instructor | See Article by Karen

HOUSING: Students are lodged at the BEST WESTERN KACHINA LODGE. Six nights including breakfast. $518 single. $415 double. (Doubles are contingent upon finding a roommate within your class.) These housing arrangements are paid directly to the school and are part of your tuition invoice. Check-in 7/13; Check-out 7/19.

Image: Karen Terpstra, Equine Clay Sculpture
The horse is a profoundly 3-dimensional creature whose beauty and nobility has inspired sculptors since early times. This weeklong workshop offers the sculptural experience to relative beginners who wish to express their love of horses as well as sufficient challenges for those with more experience.
Karen Terpstra has developed a simplified way of sculpting a horse head without the use of a complicated armature. We start by using fat coils, as well as rolling large slabs of clay, which we then assemble into a simplified horse's head, adding expression with nostrils and ears. As the clay dries to the leather hard stage, we gradually add more, ending with the mouth.
This method enables beginners to realize their dream of creating an equine sculpture, as well as encourages those more advanced in clay techniques to refine their expression. Part of the beauty of the finished sculptures comes from the Naturalistic matte glaze finish our teacher will arrange for us. A horse will be available to view, study, and pat during class time (bring carrots !) While our sculptures are being fired and glazed in a kiln, there is an opportunity to rent a horseback ride in the nearby mountains. This is a heavenly vacation for horse lovers and artists alike.
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Sun.
Mon.
Tue
Wed
Thu
Fri
Sat
Class Starts
9 AM
AM Class
Form
AM Class
Form
AM Class
Finish/Fire
AM Class
Glaze/Fire
Equine Galleries

Arrive
Check-in
PM Class
Demo
PM Class
Form
PM Class
Details
No Class
Ride/ Shop
No Class
Ride/Shop
PM noon
Kiln empty

About the Instructor

Image: Karen Terpstra, Equine Clay Sculpture

 

 

Karen Terpstra is an associate professor of ceramics at the University of Wisconsin - La Crosse in La Crosse, Wisconsin. Karen has presented 30 workshop / slide lectures since 1993 throughout the U.S. and abroad, including Ghana, Japan and Australia. She has exhibited extensively. Her Ceramic career has led to researching wood-firing in China, Ghana and Japan. She is also an avid horsewoman whose Appaloosa is a source of constant inspiration. It was a natural, then, for her to combine these two loves in her series of Equine Clay Sculptures. Some are life-sized assemblages, and others are the slab-built horse heads that you see here. Terpstra has had a dozen major articles written about her work in CERAMICS MONTHLY, CLAY TIMES, and THE STUDIO POTTER, available on our website (coming). She has exhibited in numerous National and International Invitational Exhibitions, including winning the Merit Award Prize for “Feats of Clay 8;” and Best in Show, Memorial Union Gallery, Iowa State University - 1993.

http://www.uwlax.edu/faculty/terpstra/

Taos Art School
http://taosartschool.org | tas@laplaza.org

 

TAOS ART SCHOOL
P.O. BOX 2588, TAOS, NEW MEXICO, 87571
http://taosartschool.org

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