Vcon40 and my first blog

I have been thinking about writing a blog for some time now and thought now would be a great time. It is the eve of my first Vcon Show and I have been working on various mask designs for over 6 months in preparation for the event. It has been a journey of discovery - the creative variation in my masks styles has exploded!!!!!!!!
I am not a science fiction person so learning a bit about the genera has proved to be fun. My husband and I watched Defenders of the Galaxy, About Time, old Star Wars reruns, etc. and I was sweeping the internet for images and ideas. This years convention theme = Time Travel. I wanted to be in keeping with the theme with some of my pieces however I found this to be a challenge. Time Travel: "is the science fiction concept in which people are able to move backwards into the past or forwards into the future." I majored in Archeology in University, I love historically correct novels (Dianna Gabaldon to name just one) and visiting castles when in Europe, cave dwellings in the southwest and ceremonial sites in Meso-America and the South Pacific. As a result many of my masks are inspired by events or images from traveling back in time.  Once of my creations, Uncle Desmond, was named after the character in the movie "About Time" while other inspiration came from gargoyles and plague masks of Europe in the 1600's. I developed new glazes for the gargoyles and raku fired the plague masks to add to their aura of darkness and mystery. The names of the pieces also took some work and I have my sister-in-law Jennifer in Montreal to thank for coming up with most of them. Loki is the Norse God of mischief, Doctor De Lorne is named after the doctor to Louis the Xlll during the plague and Lung'a' Pov is Klingonese for Dragon. After months of work the masks are packed and ready to be set up tonight. I think I will reward myself with a bit of time in the studio glazing pieces that came out of the bisc firing yesterday.

Meet Uncle Desmond.

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Lung'a' Pov

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Doctor De Lorne I presume ........................

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Vcon40