Pottery Logs

WEEK 1

I spent some time getting to know the studio with our teacher Ben -- a wonderful space. I'm definitely the least experienced person here, which I enjoy because I get a lot of attention and many people to learn from :)

We then got into wedging clay, preparing to throw cylinders. I feel like the wheel controls me more than I control it at this stage - I need to get used to the varying levels of force required and the types of movements. This is in contrast with other art forms I've tried: usually much effort is spent trying to let go of my need for control and let the medium guide me. I threw three small cylinders, and I'm pretty pleased with the angle of the walls and the consistency.

There was a lot of talk of 'platelets' in clay which I am now very curious about! Wedging, centering, throwing, all are optimised to compress and align 'platelets' in the clay: small flat particles that make up the body of the clay. I'm fascinated by how simple movements affect the material on such a tiny scale.

WEEK 2

Today, we learned to throw bowls. I took more detailed notes:

• basic setup and centering
  • throw clay ball into middle of wheel, pat centering
  • cone up and down 3 times with diagonal pressure (in and down)
  • leave puck slightly taller than for cylinders
• opening process differs from cylinders
  • push down only 1cm initially, then sweep outwards immediately
  • create bowl shape from start rather than flat base
  • go deeper each time (about 1cm increments) while sweeping outward
  • should look like a cylinder with hemisphere-shaped hole
• wall pulling technique
  • pull up like cylinders but keep more vertical initially
  • let bowl flare outward only on the last pull, when ready to form the final shape
  • drop water down thumb parallel to bowl wall (not from top)
  • leave ~2cm thick bottom for trimming foot later

I learned a few tricks that changed the game for me:

• Most centering problems during shaping stem from uneven pressure application
• Reduce wheel speed to ~50% after initial prep
• Too much centrifugal force causes collapse

I find it hard to get good size out of the same ball of clay that my teacher uses: losing loads to my hands or washing it away when I add water. These bowls will shrink by 10-12% by the time they're done being fired, which is kind of sad.

Several of my bowls collapsed, but I made 4 successfully:

WEEK 3

Trimming. It has to be done: pots look pretty thick and unfinished straight off the wheel, so after they dry a little, we have to shave away at the surface until it has the desired finish. Notably, you get to put a foot on the bottom and clean up the rim.

This has got to be my least favourite part of throwing pottery. If you're not careful, you can cut through the bottom of your bowls by accident, which was the fate of half of the stuff I had made so far.

WEEK 4

Pretty standard throwing session, I started throwing with a little more clay. Good results but that last bowl got too thin on the bottom and collapsed. I wonder what proportion of the pots I start making actually make it to the finish line.

WEEK 5

And here, you can see that I trimmed last week's pots (except the one that collapsed) into quite nice forms!

Handles are also surprisingly hard. I made about 15 that I was unsatisfied with before finally attaching one with significant help from my teacher. The mug is really cute (I ended up losing it because I forgot to write my initials on it...). Quite pleased with the angular bowl with the large foot too.

WEEK 6

I glaze my work for the first time! It's really fun: we get to pick from so many colours and mix them and not know how any of it is going to look. My teacher says it's the last chance to affect how the pot looks and so it's very important. It's also unexpectedly challenging: it looks like dunking your pot in paint, but actually the glaze, which is a suspension of silica particles and pigment in water, has to be perfectly mixed so that enough of it is caught on your pot. Your pot must be slightly wet after wiping off dust, but too wet and the water in the glaze never gets absorbed and the glaze slides off. Glaze too thin and the pot is not foodsafe. Glaze too thick and the glaze 'melts' off and 'slumps' in the kiln, leaving unglazed patches and overglazed patches. Not to mention, if you glaze too close to the bottom of the pot, it might stick to the kiln, ruining your work and the kiln shelf. I had no idea so many things could go wrong with dipping a pot in a bucket of glaze. The glaze colours at Turning Earth have such cute names: tenmoku, cotton, monet, noriko nori, mustard.

I also threw my first vase, and it was also the first time I threw a kilo of clay.

WEEK 7

Spent this session trying to throw larger bowls. I enjoy bowls but they do collapse easily! Everything shrinks so much when fired, but these feel like they'll be a useful size even after.

WEEK 8

Trimmed a bunch of my work, mostly ruining them by trimming through the bottom or stamping it. Really frustrated today! Probably because I was hungry. No photos taken as a result XD

Week 9 was missed due to a very fun trip which means I didn't get to make anything new due to time taken for firing... so I just did a lot of practice throwing and finishing up the stuff I had already made over the next couple weeks

FINAL ROUNDUP OF WORK

It's not as much stuff as I'd have hoped, and it's mostly useless in shape or form, but I am quite happy with the glazes and the techniques that I learned: I am set up well to practice this skill without supervision in the future. I can't wait to be in a stable part of life, to sign up for a studio, and to just put in hours and hours.