Ceramic Hello Kitty: Supra Little One

And now my third and final my three Hello Kitty ceramic figures I created at the Symposium-Workshop in Hungary a month ago! I was just about to write about it till I got “interrupted” by a short break to Switzerland late last week. As you recall, this ceramics workshop was hosted by artist and now friend Neil Wolstenholme from whom I’ve been purchasing quite a few of his hand made Hello Kitty porcelain figures in the past. I have then been wanting to create my bespoke creation so was very keen to participate in his workshop. After the success of the first one (Classic version) and the second one (Flower Power), Neil thought it would be an idea to incorporate my muse, Little One, in the picture. How exciting!

Creating Hello Kitty

On our first day of the Workshop, Neil demonstrated how his Hello Kitty figures are formed using liquid ceramic and pre-made molds as per Hello Kitty Molded. And once dry, they look like these!

First Firing

Then they are fired in the kiln at 900°C, that’s right, 900°C! As it takes time for the kiln to heat up to that temperature and then to cool down slowly, they are left in there overnight. It is important that the ceramic items do in fact have the chance to cool down slowly and not be removed too soon as a sudden change in temperature could cause them to snap. And here goes…

Choosing the Color

Painting Little One on the front of Hello Kitty’s torso was a brilliant idea! After all, she is my muse and is featured in many of my artwork, so how could I not do that? However, I was struggling at first to figure out the color scheme. In my Classic Hello Kitty Version, we have red and blue. Then pink was used for the Flower Power Kitty. I didn’t want to repeat red or pink although they are typical Hello Kitty Colors. And of course! My boyfriend who joined me on this course was busy creating his stuff, a few mini ceramic Toyota Supra sports cars, painting them in yellow because well, that is the color of his car. And so I chose that particular yellow as well to match the set. How cute is that! And hence the ribbon was painted yellow first. Then with a thin Chinese brush, I carefully drew my outline of Little One in black and let it dry before filling in her dress with the same yellow shade. The eyes and whiskers this time were a light grey, and I deliberately left the nose out although it’s normally yellow because I wanted to focus on the ribbon and the outfit.

Second Firing

After a few layers of the paint and letting it all dry, most of our work including two of my Hello Kitty figures got dunked into a bucket of white liquid which is the glaze. Then they are fired at a much higher temperature than before, 1,250°C. Now that’s very very hot! And for the same reason as the first firing, they were left in the kiln overnight for the temperature to gradually rise and cool down slowly. So the next morning upon our departure on our last day, we came to collect our stuff, and wow, just as I had wanted it! And it perfectly matches our yellow Toyota Supra.

And this concludes my Trilogy of Hello Kitty porcelain figures! I had been looking forward to this workshop, as I got to create my own bespoke Kitty’s, seeing that I am a huge fan and avid collector of this adorable feline character. They are now scattered around the house proudly being displayed as a reminder of my achievement and how much fun I had. In addition to Hello Kitty, I also had the chance to create other forms of pottery: Cobalt painting of various ceramic crockery and creating from scratch my Little One figure. I’ll be writing about them in due course so please watch this space!