Kathman Gallery: Custom Glazes Other Breeds

CUSTOM GLAZES OTHER BREEDS

Chesney
Black silver dapple pony stallion, customized from the Sarah Rose Hadrian bisque. Created 2007. Leslie describes this piece: Over the years I’ve certainly researched a lot of really odd horses, but it’s rare that the really wild stuff ever makes it onto a model. So he’s a bit of an exception. I worked on him during the coldest part of winter, so maybe it was my wish for sun that made me try a sunburned black. (He does get his name from the song, “All I want for Christmas is a real good tan”!) That was what I was shooting for, but I think he looks a bit more like an aged black silver with the dark streaks in his nearly flaxen mane. Then I added a few patterns – first splash to give him a very white face and blue eyes, and then sabino to lace the edges of his markings. But his most unusual pattern is only really visible from above, where he sports reticulated spots, sometimes called “lacing” or “giraffe markings”. All in all, it makes Chesney a rather exotic fellow and probably not much like any other Hadrian out there.

Bentley
Dapple bay Tarpan stallion, customized from the Pour Horse Nomad earthenware bisque. Created 2007. Leslie describes this piece: I said I would eventually get brave enough to dapple a solid horse in earthenware. The technique requires an extremely soft touch, and it’s not especially forgiving. The prospect of spending hours on layers, only to ruin it somewhere along the line, was pretty discouraging. But I thought I could pull it off, and that’s how I got Bentley. He’s a Pour Horse Nomad (because it was easier to be brave on a mold that is easy to demold and clean!), and he’s a dappled bay with a blaze and hind socks. He ranges in color from a bright golden-red to deep chocolate and black, all with soft, subtle transitions. I couldn’t be more pleased (well, I might be even more pleased if I am able to ever pull this type of color off again).

Violet
Chestnut sabino Cob mare, customized from the Pour Horse Limerick bisque. Created 2007. Leslie describes this piece: When I did the dapple grey Limerick “Tweed” for the last lottery, I knew I’d have to do the other color I tend to think of as quintessentially English – a bright red chestnut with sabino markings. Violet is probably a good bit louder than the typical sabino Cob, but I think all her lacey markings flatter her. She also has a golden flaxen mane (roached, of course) and tail, and intricately detailed shell hooves. But the real detail on her is in those markings, from the irregular patches on her forlegs and ticked jawline to her extensively patterned belly.

Alaska
Silver daple pinto grade gelding, custom glazed from the Sarah Minkiewicz-Breunit Stormwatch; created 2008. Leslie describes this piece: I decided to call my guy "Alaska", because the golden-brown ends of his dirty mane and tail reminded me of the meringue topping on a Baked Alaska. And it did seem appropriate to name the fellow after some kind of food!

Nitewatch
Chocolate chestnut tovero part Arabian stallion, customized from the Deborah McDermott's Al-Hadiye bisque. Created 2007. Leslie describes this piece: This fellow is the first publicly offered piece from our new release for 2007, Deborah McDermott's Al-Hadiye. He is also a tribute horse, of a sort, to my longtime friend and colleague Judy Renee Pope.

When Judy and I met more than twenty years ago, we were both relatively new artists specializing in mini-scale models. We also shared a love of Arabian horses and their pedigrees. Judy had already been on my mind as I worked on Al-Hadiye, when I heard about her hospitalization. I had always meant to create a horse that reflected the two horses that we were probably best-known for all those years ago - her liver chestnut sabino Arabian stallion "*Valotte" and my pinto part-Arabian "Love's Perfection" - but somehow never got around to the project. When I heard we had lost her, it seemed important to mark the influence she had in my development as an artist, and I decided it was time to make the horse I had envisioned long ago.

NiteWatch is a reddish chocolate color with a pale blonde forelock - colors that will be familiar to fan's of Judy's painting. On top of that is an intricate tovero pattern with sabino-influenced lacey edges. He has a blaze and white chin that extends under his jaw on both left and right sides, and a white mane and tail with creamy ends. The sculpture is surprisingly small in person - only 2.5" high - yet still has the most wonderful detail.

Gossamer
Dapple rose grey Arabian stallion, customized from the Deborah McDermott's Al-Hadiye bisque. Created 2008. Leslie describes this piece: When I was a teen, I responded to an offer for a free sample issue of the Arabian Horse World. And there they were - hundreds of pages of horses so beautiful it was hard to believe they were real. Elfin horses! Ardent Tolkien fan that I was, that's what I imagined them to be. That was why I approached Deb McDermott about casting Al-Hadiye. He reminded me of those long-ago horses - particularly the young *El Shaklan. When I imagined him in china, it was that shade of pale, rosey dapple grey that I saw. I wasn't sure I could pull it off - you only seem to get pale hints of red in ceramic when you want strong red! - but I had to try. And it worked. This guy turned out just as I envisioned him, which is a rare enough thing for a ceramic artist. (Kilns always have their own ideas about the horses you give them.) He's extremely fine, with an abundance of tiny, tiny dapples under a thin matte glaze. Holding him in your hand, he seems almost like a fairy horse himself.

Sullivan
Grulla tovero Tinker Pony stallion, customized from the Donna Channey/Animal Artistry Highland Pony bisque. Created 2007. Leslie describes this piece: The mold is a bone china Highland Pony from Animal Artistry. He's been glazed as a pale grulla tovero Tinker Pony with one blue eye. Some might mistake Sully for a pintaloosa, with all the roaning and ticking (darker and lighter than the body color) on his hindquarters, but he was intended to show a variation of sabino roaning that tends to concentrate on the hindquarters. Regardless of how it is classified, it gives a lot of detail and interest to the piece, while the softer body color keeps the effect more subtle than it would be on a darker base color.

Charity
Dapple grey Shetland mare, customized from the Kristina Lucas rancis Maggie bisque. Created 2008. Leslie describes this piece: Maggie remains my favorite of the early Pour Horse sculptures. Joan had just started producing her when she invited me out for my first visit to the factory, so she was one of the first pieces I ever glazed. For the past month or so Charity here has been sitting on my desk beside the little bay roan Maggie I made almost exactly ten years ago. What we can do now that we never dreamed of then! And this particular Maggie represents the best of what we know about making dapple grey horses in ceramic underglaze. It's a color that really suits this particular mold. Like her fellow grey in this lottery, Gossamer, she has a matte finish that really shows off all the tiny detail in her dappling. She also has a sculpted base to match, which her new owner can glue her to if they wish. (She can stand without a base, though not perhaps as securely as most might want.)

Phoenix
Chestnut pinto grade pony mare, customized from the Sarah Minkiewicz-Breunig Spinnaker bisque. Created 2008 as a donation for RESS.

Shindig
Chestnut tovero grade pony mare, customized from the Sarah Minkiewicz-Breunig Spinnaker bisque. Created circa 2006.

Elvis Impersonator
Bay roan pinto grade pony mare, customized from the Sarah Minkiewicz-Breunig Spinnaker bisque. Created circa 2008.

Name unknown
Dapple grey Andalusian stallion, customized from the Donna Channey/Animal Artistry Mini Andalusian bisque. Created 2008.

Name unknown
Dun Paint colt, customized from the Carol Williams Okie Rio bisque. Created 2008. Leslie describes this piece: This guy was the first horse out of the kiln for the new year. He's a rare custom order, donated to a benefit auction for Habitat for Humanity. I think he looks a little worried in this photo. Maybe he knows we are supposed to get more snow in the morning! His color is a little off in these photos. In person he's more mousey and less tawny. I rely a great deal on the natural light in the house when I take photos, and there hasn't been much of that with all these storms. Hopefully I'll get the chance to get better photos when the weather clears.

Joy
Bay snowcap Appaloosa filly, customized from the Sarah Minkiewicz-Breunig Pixie bisque. Created 2008. Leslie describes this piece: She is intended to be a foal-coated snowcap appaloosa. She's young enough not to have developed her facial mottling (though she does have pink, speckled skin under her upturned tail), so she has the dark skin around her eyes and mouth that give her soft, appealing expression. She also has softly suggested tonal variations along her cheeks and chest. She has no facial white, one hind sock, and the shell hooves one would expect to see on a homozygous appaloosa. (Heterozygous appaloosas - the spotted ones - have striped hooves. Homozygous ones do not.) She was originally intended for my own collection, which is why she is a pattern not often seen in custom glazes.

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