plaster 202

If it's the week before spring break, it must be time to pour some plaster!  You know the drill by now.  Here's how it went this year....

The Wednesday night class was upstairs all anxious about their cardboard molds while I was out on the Sculpture Deck setting up for plaster.  As soon as I finished, the skies darkened ominously and the wind picked up.  Moments later, it was a full-fledged storm with heavy rain, high wind and a little thunder.  The plastic I put down to catch the plaster held a couple of inches of rain water while MG and Hope danced in the storm.  Just as my freshman friends were trickling downstairs with fear on their faces, the rain stopped.  Perfect timing.

They were as ready as they were going to be.

It only takes a minute for things the McAbee induced chaos to begin.

Despite the fear, the stress soon turned into smiles and laughter.

I love the range of emotions during that first pour.

My  new friend Mackenzie mixing.

Ava had a good sense of humor about it all.

This one wavered between wanting to hurt me and enjoying herself.

Happy/sad.

The after photo.

Cathryn had a plaster pour birthday and it was perfect to celebrate with the plaster Sculpture Cake.

The Thursday morning crew before.

One minute later.

Leaders rose up and all sorts of personality types revealed themselves.

Sadly, we forgot to get an after photo.

The Thursday afternoon crowd before.

One minute later.

Hannah was the one that most wanted to hurt me in this class.

No, I don't even try to keep the plaster in the molds.

The after photo.

The Thursday night class.  They had the benefit of seeing and hearing all about it.

Not that any of that helped.

Payton ate a little plaster.  Pretty sure that's not harmful.

The students from the earlier classes came back to offer really unsound advice to the pourers.  It's funny to see them sabatoge each other like that.

The less evil ones just came back to watch and laugh.

The final after photo.

And now all the freshmen have been officially anointed as Art+Design people.  Next year they'll speak fear into the new crop of freshies as they prepare for their baptism in plaster.  The circle of life is cool.

plaster woooooo!

If it's spring semester, it must be time for the annual plaster pour!  The most wonderful time of the year...

It's sort of a tradition to build excitement by digging up a bunch of photos from previous years.  Anne, just left of the yellow bucket of plaster, provided some from the years my computer has lost.

When you've done this for a lot of years, you remember the students individually, but sometimes you forget that Jamea, Dublin and Buttercup all overlapped in the same freshman level class.

But you never forget the chaos of the day.  I love plaster pouring day.

This year the first class to pour was Emily's Wednesday evening class.  This was Emily's first class as a professor and she was a student in this class just a few years ago.  It always starts out looking so organized and prepared.

The students all look so clean and innocent.

Two minutes later, they've had their first real experience with me.  It's great.

The "after" photo usually shows an older, wiser student.  And one who is relieved to be finished.

The next morning, we were all set to begin again with a new, clean group of Haley's students.

Two minutes later...

An there they are, older and wiser and only slightly less clean.

We usually inherit some interesting trash during plaster day.  This gorgeous still life was found in the top of a trash can.

After a quick peanut butter and jelly sandwich, it was time for the last group.

One of my favorite things is the audience that appears to watch the show.

This is the last group in their "after" photo.  You can feel this one.

And you can definitely feel this one.

Another successful experience and another group of students bonded by fun trauma.  

 

plaster pouring day!

Spring semester is always so busy but it also provides some of the high points of the academic year.  One of those is, of course, plaster pouring day.  Plaster pouring day in 2020 was one of the last group things we were able to do before getting kicked off campus and into quarantine.  I honestly wasn't sure what it would look like this year with new considerations, but we were able to work things out just fine.  

There was one glitch, though.  I'm only teaching one of our three freshman design courses.  I had planned to ask if I could help out on plaster pouring day like I did last year.  Before I could ask, my colleague was forced into quarantine and unable to be on campus for the big event and asked me to fill in.  I was happy to do so.

Here's the summary in photos...

The "before" photo of the morning class featuring Asia, who just loves to come help out every year.  I love her.

Things got messy fast.

Sometimes you just have to jump in and hug a leaking mold.

The "after" photo.  Much better.

Asia deserved a pat on the back for her outstanding efforts.

The afternoon class 

"before" photo.

Immediate chaos.

Smiles amid the chaos.

The "after" photo.

Jocelyn was there to spectate and we were able to recreate her photo from 4 years ago.

The original photo.

Then it was time for my class.  The "before" photo.

The chaos.

The "after" photo.  

We were lucky to be able to work outside this year but the sculpture deck still hasn't fully recovered.  

Once again I was able to watch students come out of their shells and begin to work together as a team.  The sense of community was much stronger after this experience.  Long live plaster pouring day!