Studio Saturday - small steps with ceramics

Gradually some little fabric pots are accumulating, on days when I listen to a podcast and sew while having the first coffee of the morning. 

When I arrived at the studio I put the padlock and keys on one side of the desk, and my five little pots for dipping on the other side -

 Jackie had left some info on plaster moulds, in response to my mention of thinking of maybe using some -

 The fab five -

Oops, fabric can collapse, I had somehow forgotten that - but it led to a new way of gathering and storing info -

 Five pots drying out -

Studio Saturday

Getting pots ready for "Aurora"s first firing -

 In...

 ... and out ...

The cones show that it would be a good idea to try a lower temperature, 1220 perhaps, and save some electricity. This firing used 11.6 kWh.

Some results - using fabric strips and oddments of wire -

No metal, just gathered synthetic fabric and heat-setting

The rest -

All very light=fragile; one crumbled when I picked it up. Next time, thicker slip!

Studio Saturday

With only a week to go till the Open Studio, most of my studio activity has been of the sifting-and-sorting variety - contemplative rather than active.

It's a good opportunity to have a clear-out - not necessarily of work, but of all the objects and appurtenances that accumulate around the making of work. Even after just six months, my workspace is cluttered with useless things. Here I can be ruthless!

A week ago I was still thinking of making last-minute pots

but by the time what's on hand had been looked at, there seemed to be enough for a varied display. Not everything was 100% perfect, so I kept thinking about how to make the most of the imperfections - eg, those breakages could be enhanced with a little kintsukuroi-type mending...

Forgotten items emerged -

The glass of the beads makes areas of glaze

Adding pins and staples

 Groups formed -

 The pots started talking to each other -

 not always amicably....

 Could my woodblock prints be incorporated in the "staging"?

The most exciting development is the arrival of  bling  - a tongue-in-cheek nod to kintsukuroi - on slightly chipped and otherwise unwanted items. Judiciously used, of course - the price of gold (23 3/4 carat) being what it is, less is more -

Before - paper-clay pots from a few years ago

After - "precious pots"

The home studio is getting a bit of a turfing-out, in search of other ceramic lilies to gild and repair, not necessarily in that order -

Studio Saturday

A stoneware firing -

 ... my little pots among the big impressive ones -

 No shards this time - though some of the 15 had small imperfections - small, but imperfections none the less -

After photographing each one, the next step is to record and analyse -

 A bit of fun with pots-among-the-limpets ...

 And gathering some groups -

Before an after - except that one hasn't been fired yet. This shows how much they shrink -

 More fun with the broken pots - combined with woodblock prints?

Wrapped in thread but pieces keep crumbling away - perhaps dip it into wax... see what happens ...

 I invested in some gilding supplies and found some paperclay potlets to practise on -

 Midweek, I felt that things were starting to sort themselves out -

But on Monday the electrician who is hooking up the new kiln will need access to the fuse box above my desk, so the fragile pots have been put out of harm's way, after yet more sorting and list-making and some vague thoughts about The Way Forward ... but Action can wait till after the Open Studio, 24 November, has been prepared for and experienced.

A few dipped pots have been waiting to be "fixed" for weeks now. The tall ones have holes in the base, unfortunately, but other than that they're almost ready to fire -

 Here's a "before and after" ... dull, dull, dull ...

This little one has lost it's data sheet - or never had one - or there's been a mismatch ... it can get very confusing!

I've not been entirely systematic, and indeed the main aim of "my system" has been to identify the pots in terms of how they were made from fabric and what materials were used, and to match the ephemeral fabric pot (Before) with the end product (After). Keeping a record encourages close looking and identification of the problems - and good points! - through which I'm starting to find out what I want and don't want to carry on with. Gradually you get into a sort of rhythm and feel calmer and bolder, striding out into the unknown, hopefully - rather than going around in tiny fussy circles.

One of my plans for next week is to do some gilding of broken pots; this will include a good rummage among Old Work and possibly some culling. Even thinking about it makes me uncomfortable ... smash my pots?? ... well, we'll see....

Studio Saturday

The first part of the week was eaten up by the need to get the windows painted, but on Thursday I spent the entire day at the studio.

First thing in the morning, Tom and Kyle put in the trunking and cable for the new kiln. Next week a proper electrician will make the connections and provide a certificate.

While they stepped on my desk (etc) I sat, away from the action, and got quite a lot of knitting done.

Later there was a bit of photography of people's work that was sitting around, thinking ahead to making an invitation for the Open Studio on Saturday 24 November. More info later, such as timing, but I can reveal that the address is 3 Wedmore Street, London N19 4RU, off Holloway.

Lindsay

Kate M

Jackie

Kate D

 As you can see, we're a diverse lot of potters/ceramicists.

Meanwhile my claim to being a potter/ceramicist took a small step forward as I looked carefully at what came out of the latest firing -

some 32 pots, 18 of which were ok structurally, though some of those did have broken bits upon close examination.

First each pot was photographed (for the record) and then I looked closely at it and thought hard about it and made notes, and gradually a list of "what to try next" formed in my studio notebook. (The little pot holds the shards. Those need recording too.)

More pots that are shards - or implosions - or "interesting" in that they can be treated in different ways, perhaps playfully, perhaps transformatively...

As the day wore on, I kept wondering "Will it arrive?" - and finally, after 4pm, it did the kiln was delivered, all the way from Stoke-on-Trent -

 Thanks to the helpful driver, who made sure it got safely into the studio -

 We unwrapped it ....

 ... and put "Aurora" in the kiln room, where she'll have to wait till next week to be connected up. And then the test firing. And then the real stuff can start!

More than a dozen dipped pots need tidying up before firing, and another dozen or so are stitched but not dipped. That's "the old stuff". 

Going forward, the list of what to try next (in the studio notebook) contains, as subtext, an implicit list of what not to bother with henceforth. For instance, I find the texture on the crochet pots too textured, generally (but they were easy to make, something to do while travelling) - instead I like the subtle textures of the bias pots, which unfortunately have a tendency to fall apart at the rim or crumble under less-than-gentle handling.

Also I'm (still; always...) thinking of ways to display - how about pots on "magic carpets"? -

 These are scraps with stitched marks - asemic writing, sometimes inspired by overheard one-sided conversations, interminable monologues on mobile phones in a train carriage...

Such conversations could erupt from the tranquility of the pot ....

On Friday, various rearrangements of the unbroken pots for the publicity shot for the Open Studio invitation 

 and yet another new arrival - some heating!

In fact we have two of these oil-filled radiators. I'm rather dreading the cold weather and it will be lovely to have somewhere to warm up the frozen fingers...