Trying Techniques

So here they are: my first three pots made using the coiling method.

The initial attempt was, not surprisingly, a complete failure, but it was extremely useful as it revealed the main areas to be focused on.

Accordingly, my first completed pot was mainly a study in how to pull the form inward as the height increased.  This is, of course, a prominent factor in wheel-thrown work, so I should have been prepared for the same need in coiling; however, the techniques used are - at first try, at least - considerably different.  My beginner's version is a bit heavy-handed!  But I did end up with a pot...

A rather lumpy piece, but the goal was achieved, along with learning to work with the requirements imposed by crafting the base in my mould.

The next piece was a continuation of the same aim; it also played with a more complex form.

Finishing the rim became a major issue on this one, and one which I did not solve to my satisfaction, but I was certainly pushing harder in this case.  I also felt that I had not thinned or worked the walls to a suitable degree of plasticity; however, as the pot dried, I was pleased with the weight and overall "feel".  This second pot gave me a stronger sense of what I needed to achieve in a more finished piece.

So with the third pot the form was simpler, but the piece was every way more satisfactory.  It is getting much easier to produce a basic cylinder to commence the piece.  Besides that, I thinned the walls and shaped the pot, not merely while coiling, but also by using a beating process as the clay dried a little.  The result was a small bowl...

...one which I was finally willing to put my stamp on.

I wish I could express in the photographs the "touch" of these pieces.  Somehow there is far more of the hands in them than I ever achieved in wheel-thrown work.  It is warm, with a far more intimate acquaintance between hands and clay.  It is a sensation that is likely to keep me working in this mode for quite a while...

Homemade Sopes in a Handmade Bowl

Just enjoying yesterday's cooking...

...masa sopes with chicken, mushrooms, sour cream, and lime...

...served in a handthrown bowl made from my red earthenware clay...

Bon appetit!

Preparing to Experiment: a Mould for Coiled Pottery

This is a project that is the commencement of a larger project.

All of my pottery for many years (no, I don't think I'll say how many!) has been wheel thrown.  I have loved the process: the nearly fluid clay, the smooth flow of opening and raising a cylinder, coaxing the nuances of form into the thinned walls, and creating all the delicate finality of the lip.  So it is to my own surprise that I find the question recurring: should I try an entirely new technique?

More than one factor has been contributing to the question.  The first is one of form.  Ever since I began in ceramics, I have been deeply impressed by classic coiled pottery forms.  In particular I have admired Minoan ceramics, which I feel are not given enough attention.  Their decoration is so perfectly in accord with the forms beneath, everything so balanced into a single unit of aesthetic excellence.  But beyond this, I love the shapes, and the shapes are by no means natural to wheel-thrown work.

More recently I've begun paying closer attention to the traditional ceramics of the Americas.  These, again, are hand-built, not wheel-thrown.  A recent series of vases - still unfired - found me attempting to simulate these effects on the wheel.  It is not so much a question of it being difficult, but rather of it being unnatural to the technique.  I suppose I am being a bit of a purist, but why should I attempt these forms on the wheel when they are in their native element coiled?

Two unfired vases from the series inspired by traditional coiled forms

A second reason is my increasing preference for maximizing what I can do with just my hands , minimizing the mechanical elements in the workflow.   This is merely a personal preference, but it is making me drastically rethink the ways I create.

Truth to tell, I've never coiled pottery successfully.  I've never been interested in learning.  Till now.

So I have been spending quite a bit of time studying up lately.  And among other things I find that many traditional techniques from around the world commence the coiling with a base formed inside a slump mould.  This mould, in which the piece remains until the pot's form is complete, provides support to its lower section as it increases in height.  It is a coiled version of all the care that goes into gauging how thick to throw the walls near the base of a wheel-formed pot.

I decided to give myself the advantage of starting with such a mould in my earliest experiments.  This meant making the mould.  I went out to the wheel...  Yes, I threw the basic form!  Old habits will die hard if they die at all!  I prepared everything for casting; and my sister, who knows how I detest mould-making, kindly did the actual pouring.

I half-intended to let the form dry and shrink inside the cast plaster, but my sister reminded me that I had used my stoneware clay.  This is my own recipe; it is quite plastic and is notoriously tough when fully dried - not the typical fragile greenware of less plastic clay bodies.  So I dug out the form, which released easily from the still damp plaster, leaving the new mould almost ready to go.

Since then I have cleaned it up and smoothed down the rough edges.  The throwing lines are still visible in places.

This is not a precision job by any means, but I hope it will give me a good start in trying this very traditional approach to creating with clay.

Introducing the Handmaker's World

Rather than begin this blog with a sense of starting in the middle, I thought perhaps I should explain a little.

For years I have made things with my hands: pottery and textiles in particular, but also the occasional foray into leathercraft and jewelry and various other materials.  And certainly food!  More recently I have produced a good deal of digital work and been happy with the results.  But it is time to return to an emphasis on what I love best - handwork.

For me, it is a world of wonder.

The making of things with my fingers and mind.

Watching a tangible object come into being beneath my hands.

Working with the raw materials that untold millenia of human beings have used: clay, wool, cotton, leather, silver.  The thrill of making a new world around me from elements and techniques developed over many generations.

So this blog is a window into that little world of marvels.  I hope you will enjoy it!

To those of you who have kindly followed me this far from other platforms and other blogs, I will explain a little further.  Some months ago I started the Journal of a Thousand Things, hoping it would be a good way to share some of my material not associated with photography or my desert garden.  Instead, it proved to be the proverbial catch-all, especially since I often gave no background on what I posted.  The Journal will probably continue as primarily a photography blog, and the Small, Sunny Garden will most certainly continue as part of my gardening adventure.  But it is here in the Handmaker's World that I will be pursuing my love of creating.  And here I can give the necessary background to my work as I go along, so I hope it will be more enjoyable to the reader.

A new blog, a new world as I begin to focus intensely once more on handmaking and the life it creates.