It just slipped out!

 

"Slipped" out, get it?? 

I've been making some rustic, torn-edge plates in class, aiming for a loose, spontaneous, almost found-object quality. My own work is pretty tightly thrown (not entirely on purpose!) and over-decorated, although I do enjoy letting the soda vapor have its way with the piece during the firing. There's a wide world of approaches to clay out there, and I wanted to give my students a taste of a different aesthetic. 

It sorta worked - they got the idea - but then another idea popped up in class, one I had talked about earlier: aesthetic tension. Sometimes what makes a piece intriguing is when two dueling aesthetics are mashed together! With that in mind, and because I can't help myself one the slip bottle is in my hand, I trailed some delicate flowers onto my meaty rustic plates. 

I have to credit a student for the poppies! I mentioned that I had been trying to figure out how to make a recognizable poppy with slip; I turned my back for a sec & when I turned back she had made 2 on the worktable! Victoria is a very talented sliptrailer (and formerly a cake decorator!) I learn so much from my students. 

These will probably not be soda-fired, since students don't have access to the soda kiln so it feels like cheating to use that method to finish my demos. SO, I am thinking, iron oxide on the back & edges, then shino on the front face. 

I'm excited about these & plan to make more at home! 

The Glaze Challenge

People often ask if I offer classes. I teach, but not at my studio. I'm not set up for that, and more than that I am far, far too much of an introvert to feel comfortable with other people in my space on the regular. Just in the last year or two introversion has become fashionable, with entire articles written about how to interact with us, as if we were some rare species of  gnu that might shy away or bite if not handled properly. Or maybe an orchid, that would wither if exposed to too much personal interaction.

These articles make me laugh - I promise you, you've been successfully interacting with introverts all your life without an instruction manual! I'm not a fragile flower (although I am a snowflake, I must be, strangers [mostly unpleasant ones] tell me so every single day!) and I don't require delicate handling. I do recharge myself with alone time, and being social is work for me. But as I often say, anything worth doing is a lot of work! Some things which are work are also fun.

ANYWAY. Got off track. As I was saying, I don't offer classes here, but I do teach a few classes at Portland Pottery. I teach adults, at mixed skill levels. Beginners are the easiest - anything I show them advances their knowledge. ANY project will grow their skills. My later intermediate & advanced students are trickier; I want to help them pursue their own projects but I also want to push them a little. It's easy when you are finally making things you like to stop striving for new skills - that's why you need a teacher.

Our latest class project was designed to push people to try new surface treatments. I found and printed out some color/ pattern swatches, snipped them to about 2" x 2" so they wouldn't be recognizable as paintings, fabric, ceramics, or whatever. I put the bits of paper in a bowl and had students reach in & pull one out. That then was their assignment: replicate that as a ceramic surface, using any method available. Here are some of our results:

I am missing a few - I swear I took photos of all of them but somehow the photos are nowhere.

Underglaze was a popular approach, and some people tried underglaze crayons for the first time. There were wax/latex patterns, and brave efforts to try and apply glazes in such a way as to replicate the look.

I often do some version of a class project, and thins was one of my favorites! It was great fun for me to see the different approaches people took. I will find ten more snips online, and we will do this project again.

Rhymes with Hug

A mug is the most intimate of pots. Unlike a plate or a bowl or a butterdish, you spent quality time with a mug: every morning, with coffee; cold winter afternoon, with hot chocolate: and in the evenings nothing beats a mug of chamomile tea to help you sleep.

As you hold and sip, your hands embrace a mug, your fingers run over its surface. You learn its eccentricities. You get to know a mug. It's no coincidence that "mug" rhymes with "hug."

Oh, wait. Yes it is. It is a coincidence.

Moving right along.

We were talking about mugs, in class. Handles. Lips. The landscape of surface that entertains your fingertips. There should always, in my mind, be more to a mug than meets the eye. I borrowed several examples for class from the Portland Pottery Cafe, where they have may mugs & other pots for sale. Here are a few:

Steve Zoldak

This one is me.

Me again

Marie Palluotto, Red Door Pottery

Tyler Gulden

Sorry for the crap photos - my good camera died.

So, funny story! I had a birthday last week. My Tuesday night class are mostly repeat students, some for several years, so we all know each other pretty well. We had cupcakes.

This week, I bring in these mugs from the cafe to discuss what makes a good mug, and in discussing the last one, the Tyler Gulden mug, I uttered these fateful words: "This one is my favorite. I thought about asking Tyler for this glaze recipe, but then I realized, I don't even want the glaze, I just want this mug. If I ever have $50 all in one place..."

My students! What scamps. They had one person distract me with questions, awhile another ran over to the cafe to purchase the mug for me, as a birthday present! You guys. I heart you.

I am looking forward to getting to know this mug.

Finally Finished!

You've probably heard me say that pottery is artwork that is only really finished when it's in use. I love when people send me pictures of the ware, finally finished! My friend Ellen recently sent me this one:

The colors look great together, and I am especially proud that the plate shrunk to exactly the diameter of a standard cake, U.S.

Thanks Ellen!

My Students are Awesome, Part a Million and One

Ellen is reaching for the sky!

Patricia is calling these "butter temples" because "dishes" just doesn't seem to cover it!

Building Blocks

Once in a while I invite my intermediate and advanced students to play a game called Building Blocks: we each throw two "torsos" - pieces large enough to become the main body of a pot - and three to five additions - spouts, handles, feet, small cylinders that can be cut up to create other shapes. It's a valuable exercise in that it casts the wheel in a new light: more like a slab roller or an extruder. Not as a source of finished pieces but as a tool, to make shapes that then become pieces. Also, it's fun! Above is our collection of building blocks; below are some of the pots which arose from them.

Seated Lid Demo

One of my students has been taking video of some of my demos, with her phone. After I got over my two seconds of stress about not wearing makeup, I thought this was a really cool idea. In this video I am making two kinds of seated lids - the sort that sit on a flat ring on the inner rim of a pot. Another student has just asked me how to make a replacement plate for the spinning tray in her microwave, out of stoneware, so the video begins with me trying to field this question.

Mishima in a Sling Mold

Mishima, misleadingly named for a Japanese city from which it did not originate, is a method of inlaying slip, engobe, or soft contrasting clay into carved or impressed texture. As I'm still having fun with my homemade texture roller, I decided to try some mishima decorating with my Monday-funday Handbuilding class. It worked so well I reprised the demo for the Tuesday Afternoon Delights and the Tuesday Awesomeness gang.

It was a sort of two-fold demo: I started by making an ad hoc mold from a rubbermaid bin and an old sheet. This is great if you want to build a larger platter or shallow bowl than you have a mold for; any container can become a sling mold. I just lay the sheet over the top, then tie a rope or bungee cords around the bin to hold it in place.The device looks a bit like a bassinet, when the sheet is secured in place. You can adjust the curve to be deeper or more shallow.

I rolled out a relatively thick slab - 1/4 inch or thereabouts. I then used the handy-dandy hot-glue texture roller that I made a couple of days ago in my home studio to impress a texture, before laying the slab in the mold. I trimmed the edges, and then lightly paddled the edges to compress.

I left it alone for a couple hours, hoping it would firm up some, but it really didn't; it was raining outside and quite cool in the studio, and of course the bin was plastic. I decided to go ahead with the mishima so the class could see the technique, even if it was less than ideal; but actually it worked just fine even on wet clay.


I spread thick slip from the sides of the bucket over the surface of the platter, then used a rubber rib to remove most of the slip, leaving behind whatever had sunk into the texture.
After letting the piece dry for a few more hours, I added a rim, made of flattened and stretched coils. Once it was leatherhard enough to move without distortion, I threw a foot - basically just a cylinder with no bottom, which I altered to be a loose rectangle - and attached it by laying the platter on top of it, while the foot ring was still quite wet. 
I ended up altering the foot much more than it appears at the top of this post, because the foot seemed so...static - in contrast to the loose, dynamic rim. (This is a constant issue when combining thrown and handbuilt elements.)


This piece will not be dry enough for the next bisque, but will make it into the one after that; I expect it to be finished around the end of this month.If it comes out especially well, I'll list it in the Pottery Shop!

"For People Who Don't Like to Center"

My Students Are Awesome, Alumni Edition:

A former student, Maya Jaafar, dropped in to class a couple of weeks ago, and she was making the coolest little dishes! I asked her to show the class what she was doing, and she told us, "This is for people who don't like to center." Here's how it works:

Take a ball of clay, between 1/2 a pound and 1 pound - Captain Obvious says, More clay for a bigger dish! - and flatten it into a thick disc. Press this to the wheelhead.



With a rolling pin, roll the disc out into a roughly round shape, about 3/16 inch in thickness.



Now impress this stuck-down slab with a texture. I have rollers for this purpose but anything will do.



Using a needle tool and the turning of the wheel, cut away any irregularities to the circle. I cut away far more than I needed to for this one; making future dishes, I only had about 1/4 inch extra all the way around.






Run your needle or wooden knife under the outer 1/2 inch or so if the textured circle, pushing it upward to make a shallow wall. Then smooth the edges with a sponge or chamois. You will need to cut the dish off the wheel, the same as if you had thrown it.



And voilà: little spoon rests, saucers and pet dishes. Simple, sweet, and neat. I learn so much from students! Maya also writes a blog, called Maya Makes Things. Check it out!

A Different Drum

My student and friend Peg, who writes her own blog here, has been working on a drum in class. I've never made a drum; I am learning so much watching her. The head of the drum will be made of goatskin (which you can get at goatskins.com. Yes, really. I don't know why I find that so amusing.) I'll get some shots of the top being finished, when Peg brings in the goatskin.

Can't wait to see it finished.

My Students are Awesome!

Have I mentioned that I love my students? Not only are they up for any class project or game I throw at them, they make up their own challenges! This group, Portland Pottery's Tuesday night class, chose to challenge each other to make the tallest thing they could out of three pounds of clay. These are all in the neighborhood of 12 - 13 inches.
Want to be a virtual part of Tuesday Night Awesomeness? If there are clay students out there reading this, sing along with Mitch! How tall can you throw three pounds?