Herøya Næringspark Exhibition

 Paintings and Ceramics by Roman Scott are now on exhibition at

Herøya Næringspark, Tormod Gjestlands veg 16, 3936 Porsgrunn

Ceramics in progress

 Yorik
slipcast greenware,
border of thinness (cranium c. 5mm--maybe a bit extreme?)

Moon
stained bisque
stain: thin sort metal glaze, half normal to half water

 Borgnine
bisque
sort metal pensel glasur on eyebrows was thinly applied to greenware before firing

 Saxeehuaman
bisque fired
two layers sort metal pensel glasur applied in two coats to bisque

plaster engraving for embossed stamp for press molded pieces

 Olmec original
greenware
stained sort metal glaze dripped and wiped to greenware before firing.


This suffered ruination, typical to the process of ripping the original clay model from a two-pieced plaster mold. Nonetheless, it is interesting, a natural ruination that one would see in a real Olmec head, thousands of years old.

Side view.
ripped-off layer reveals the additive process of making models from clay (as opposed to the preferred way of sculpting them from plaster.) Clay affords additive as well as subtractive sculpting. If something has to give when prizing apart the mold halves, the model breaks--preferable to the plaster mold, I think.

 Brain
bisque
stain of half transparent/half bordeaux glaze was thickly dipped and wiped. hard to see color before firing.

Olmec
greenware
Press-molded, two halves built.
When mold is wet after casting it, I like to press mold it to test it. It will take days for the mold to be dry enough for the slip casting process.

front view

Olmec
slip cast greenware--finally!
This casting is extremely thick, having sat overnight (no slip left to pour out!) I did this because I was so tired of wasting hours, ripping a too-thin and wet casting to pieces. It worked out--though obviously next time I need more patience, waiting a good several days for the plaster to dry and become porous enough to suck slip properly.

Side view.
Accidental ruination behind the seam--somehow it looks natural. It was due to a mishap, when the plaster leaked into the other, nonexistent half of the mold. I managed to save the whole project by just pouring the second half later, the accidental plaster fuzing to the intentional mold half.
                                                                                       







Coffee Cup
Greenware
Press molded from two mold halves.

The shape of the cup might be conical enough for a one-piece drop mold--but the beans probably have too many undercuts even so. After the trials in the jungle of the Olmecs, I didn't want to press my luck, so I opted for a two-piece, with a built handle.

Borgnine in Progress

Borgnine Toothpick Trophy, greenware, 8 cm

The other day I watched The Devil's Rain. I had not seen the film since it was in the cinemas, where I saw it as a boy when it came out in 1975. This ultimate of cult films (a B-movie both about a cult, and having a cult following), made an indelible impression on me during my single viewing of it, from the opening credits of Hieronymus Bosch details and infernal groans, to the ghastly and colorful finale.

The film is panned almost universally by critics and their laity alike. Yet it has an appealing cast: William Shatner (when he was a jobber, a journeyman wandering in the wilderness between the original Star Trek and the later films.) John Travolta, humorously, is touted in later marketing of the film, though at the time he was unknown, playing a mute, cameo-like role. And of course the jobbing actor of all time, Ernest Borgnine, makes the film, playing the leader of a Satanic cult, as well as the horned one himself, sporting makeup that would obliterate the visage of a lesser actor.  Borgnine is always great. So versatile and pliable was he, able to play both sides of the spectrum, from saintly and humane, to the maniacal and deranged. 

Tor and Yorik Cups

 Yorik (in progress, greenware, height: 7cm)

Alas, your nose bridge forms a perfect handle for a cup of tea, but how do I cast ye?

Tor (bisque earthenware, height: 13cm)

We've heard of Toby Jugs perhaps, but Tor Tankards?

Hoarding in progress

Hoard (in progress)

90x70 oil 2012

This one is closely related to Closets. The challenge is to not over-control it, allowing a surrealistic openness to shapes. The house is a container for hoarded objects. Are these objects only inanimate things, or  are they memories--or beings and activities? 

Hoarding or collecting is a kind of organization and stratification; the most wonton hoarder at least organizes through the layers (things on top of other things--strata.) The house rests on its basement, which merges with the earthy or geological stratum below.

Coast

Coast

90x70cm, oil on canvas, 2012 

Southern Oregon Coast

Cups in progress

Moon Cup

Height: 10cm

Craters upon craters. Think back to the asteroid that hit near Yucatan 65 million years ago. That whacked the climate out of shape for thousands of years after the initial days of the apocalypse, which saw temperatures rise to red hot, hotter than the glow within a pottery kiln. (Killed off the dinosaurs, giving us mammals a chance; little rodents lay in burrows, weathering the extreme oven on the surface.) This fateful crater cannot be seen today on Earth, but had it hit the moon it would still look fresh. Earth's atmosphere and geology erases traces of craters, but on the moon it seems the only thing that disturbs a given crater is another crater.

Sacsahuaman

Height: 10cm This is inspired by the terraced walls in Peru, whose style of jointing and pointing has caused such wonder and speculation. Sacsahuaman's cyclopian blocks, weighing tons each, were carved so as to fit together perfectly, joints paper-thin. 

 Brain Cup

Height: 12cm