A test form

I've been playing around with new shapes on the wheel, and tried to throw a sort of pine-cone form off the hump.

I guess one might call it "egg-shaped " too, but then that word "egg" covers multitude of possible forms. Originally, this was going to be a little mustard pot, but then I cut out the lid wonkily so I stuck it back together. I'm just keeping it as a reminder of the form, and since then I've made a few lidded pieces like this, one of which I smashed yesterday.

This morning I turned it upside down, and was struck by how much it looked like a human head.

Not an earth-shattering discovery, but maybe I could make a similar one as a sculpture. Just need to figure out a way to make it stand upright on the pointy end..maybe a plinth with a hollow in the middle could work..or a steel support with a ring for it to sit in..

April showers and a small revelation

The weather is matching my mood today..sunny then cloudy, then sunny again in quick succession. The bisque firing I did yesterday was very successful with no cracks or explosions. But then, as I was putting the fired pieces on the shelf, I pulled my hand back, and the back of my glove (pots were still very hot) caught the knob on top of a  lidded jar and off it went, falling to it's death on the concrete floor below. *Sad face*.

Next, I pulled out this little coffee cup, and was amazed to find that the white slip had stayed completely intact. I'd already fired this once before with a layer of black slip applied at leatherhard, and I thought I'd try doing some hakeme brushwork over the top. The slip was applied fairly thickly onto the bisqued clay, and normally I'd expect at least some of it to peel off. There is a bit of cracking in the crevices of the handle, but that will actually look great under a clear glaze. Not sure if I could then apply glaze over the top of the slip without re-bisquing, that will need another experiment. It would be useful if I could, as one of the problems with hakeme at the leatherhard stage is contamination of the white slip with iron oxide etc. from the dark layer below. Ofcourse, the mingling of the slip layers may also add something to the decorative effect, so it will be interesting to see what the differences are after glaze firing.

The white slip is 50/50 hvar ball clay and china clay. It might work really well..if the glaze is applied over the still-damp slip layer, it may result in a thinner application of clear glaze, which is something I want to achieve. We shall see!

Apart from stabbing myself in the finger with a needle tool, the day is now back on track. Time for some throwing followed by lots of decorating and glazing.

More work in progress

Brrrr, it's gone chilly again here, the clay was so cold on my hands this morning when rolling out coils. I've just finished the piece below on the right and I'm quite pleased with the way it's turned out, partly because it's the biggest thing I've made for a while.

Tallest one is about 12 inches

I've decided to keep these as closed forms, it will certainly make them alot easier to decorate with slip. Difficult to see on this photo, but they are roughly triangular in cross-section. I also decorated the lidded jar below with black and white slips..ideally, I could do with a larger hakeme brush which will create longer, more sweeping strokes.

Hakeme is certainly an art form, which like everything else in ceramics, requires dedicated practice. The slip needs to be at the perfect consistency, so you can lay down the top coat in as few strokes as possible..it also takes experience to be able to guess how the surface is going to look after glaze firing, once the dark iron slip burns through. I painted on the slip with the lid in place, so it will be interesting to see how easily it comes off again without ruining the decoration.

More experimentation with closed forms

Five lidded vessels and two carved sake cups

Recently, I've started making a series of these lidded jars, and I must say, I'm really enjoying the experience. I'm finding that this kind of closed form allows alot of scope for experimentation with shape and building techniques. Some are thrown whole and others are thrown and coiled. Adding a coiled component to the form gives them a slight asymmetry and perhaps more character and individuality. It also allows me to slow things down and think carefully about the outline as it develops, although there is always an element of uncertainty which I like too.

I'm not sure yet how I'll try to finish these pieces. I'd like to do some finger-wiping through slip, but the timing of that is tricky since the lid has to be cut through by hand. Adding lots of slip will soften the piece again and it will be difficult to cut the lid out without disturbing the slip layer..so I may have to add the slip after making the lid, which then creates other issues. I might also do a combination of underglaze decoration with poured ash glaze..I've been inspired recently by the freedom of expression in Toshiko Takaezu's work. I'd also like to leave a few plain, or perhaps just give them a layer of terra sigillata, then fire them in a wood kiln. Some gentle flashing on the surface of these  pots would probably work well.

I also enjoyed reading Ron Philbeck's blog today..in his last post he says how furiously hard he worked yesterday and yet only managed to partially complete five pots. I must say, I laughed when I read it, because I have so many days like that myself, when I'm left asking myself where all the time went and what the hell have I actually achieved in 24 hours. For me, the truth is that I spend more time than I should, thinking about and evaluating what I've done, what I'm going to do, the processes involved and where my work is heading etc., and maybe not enough time grafting at the wheel head. Work involving hand-building really slows you down too, and it's difficult to get a production flow going when pieces are at different stages of dryness. And ofcourse the weather affects how long the clay can be left before it requires attention again. The other problem for potters (like most artists!) is that, ideally, demand needs to match production... I remember reading about Suzuki Goro, who, after years of practice, was able to throw about 1250 yunomi in ten hours! These days in the UK, there just isn't the demand for hand-made, functional pottery to allow you to market pots on that scale. Having said that, maybe the secret is to make 1200 and only keep the best ten..but then I wouldn't fancy recycling all that clay by hand..

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A small selection of my work is available on Folksy

The Perillos Stone

An ancient stone menhir with what appears to be a human face, naturally etched into the rock.

More information here: http://www.perillos.com/cromlech.html

From the page:

What we do find, in the valley below Perillos, is an enigmatic stone, which opens up new lines of research and leaves us with some questions. This stone is limestone, and thus local to Perillos. It appears to have nothing out of the ordinary, nothing to distinguish it from the so many other scattered stones that are everywhere. But a closer inspection will show that this rock is different from the rest, as it seems that the outline of the stone is that of a human face, with an open mouth. It is clear that the stone is not sculpted, but the face is remarkably there, sculpted by nature itself… In pagan days, these stones were often set aside as sacred, as they were deemed to have been sculpted by the gods themselves. Such artwork is now described as “subliminal”, though often, such as in certain Palaeolithic caves, the design was stressed e.g. by the addition of a telling line. Mankind thus “accentuated” God’s handiwork.

Sunny days are here again

Well, we've had a beautiful week of weather here, and it's been lovely working in the studio with the sun streaming in through the doors and windows. Clay work which was taking three or four days to become leatherhard is now drying too quickly. Late last night I made a handle for a mug (we're not talking mass production here) and left it on the bench overnight to firm up a little..by the time I got to it in the morning it was rock hard and dry as a bone, so I had to chuck it away and start again. Usually that kind of thing only happens at the height of summer.

The only slight downer is that I've been feeling rather ill this week with some kind of weird bug..it's been like having a bad cold coming on but it never quite arrives or goes away. I'm grateful not to be laid out with the flu, but I've been pretty sluggish and lacking in energy. Hopefully it will be gone next week as my plan is to spend some time designing and building an experimental, mini wood-fired kiln. It's going to be a proper Heath Robinson concoction, mainly using kiln fibre and fencing mesh to make the kiln chamber, and Durox blocks for the platform. I've no idea what kind of temperatures I'll be able to reach with it..I'm guessing high earthenware (1150 degrees C) and I'll be delighted if I can get it up to cone 4 or 5.

A very mixed bag!

It was a really warm day yesterday, so I had to wait until the evening to let the kiln cool down enough to open it. Some nice pieces came out, but on the whole it was a rather disappointing firing. I thought I'd fixed the problem of my leaking sagger by sealing the top with kiln fibre, but air is still getting in somewhere. Several of my shino pots were completely oxidised, and this neph sye. shino glaze really doesn't like to breath, especially when it's laid on thicker...it bubbles like crazy.

A few pieces were fully reduced, and they came out pretty well. This carved sake cup was probably the best of the lot:






It has a transparent ash glaze on the outside and the shino on the inside..the ash glaze has brought out the iron specks in the clay nicely.

Anyway, I'll say more about this firing later, but the sun is blazing outside and it's way too lovely to be sat by the computer!

Some time later..

Well, I just pulled the saggar out of the kiln, and I now know why most of the pots were oxidised. There's an enormous crack running the whole length of the container and about 3 mm wide! Oh dear..it's lasted just one firing, whereas the last one did around 15 before cracking. The rim was on a slight tilt, so I think the weight of the kiln shelf lid, plus pots on top of that, put too much strain on one side. I could make a new saggar from crank clay..but it's difficult to get the size exactly right, & good crank is very expensive..hey ho, back to the drawing board..

For the oxidised part of the firing (the part that was meant to be oxidised!), I experimented with an oribe glaze to which I'd added a little extra copper oxide to make it darker.

Sake cup, approx. 3 inches tall, cone 9

Sake cup, other side

Sake cup, underside & foot

I also tested a slip made with black iron oxide (rather than red), with hakeme brushwork over the top. The slip recipe was as follows:

50 kaolin
50 HVAR ball clay
6% black iron oxide
4% manganese dioxide
2% cobalt oxide

No blistering or bubbling of the slip layer this time, but the transparent glaze layer has thousands of tiny bubbles and pinholes in it, making it appear quite matt. I'm really not sure where the gases can be coming from as it isn't the white slip or the clay body..perhaps it's the manganese dioxide volatising or impurities in the iron oxide? It's possible that the glaze is applied a bit too thick, but more likely it needs extra flux to allow the gases to escape.

Bottle vase, approx 4 icnhes tall, cone 9

Two head cups came out okay. The one on the right (with shino glaze) should have been reduced but is mostly oxidised thanks to the cracked saggar. The one on the left is glazed inside and out with the matt ochre-ash glaze..it was stood upside down on the tips of the horns, which worked really well..no sticking to the shelf.

Head cups, approx 3 inches tall, cone 9.

The next piece was half reduced, half oxidised..it's the same shino glaze all over, but the top half was in the oxygenated part of the saggar. That's certainly a first for me!

Tea caddy, approx 6 inches tall, cone 9