Designing and Making

I've started to hit a nice little groove in the studio after struggling to find my skills my first week back. Last week was productive and I got about 50 small pots made. It had been a very long studio layoff while we played, and played, and played on Cape during the summer.

I'm getting ready for a few shows this fall and right now I'm focusing on the waxed/incised/slipped deco. I am planning on getting some decalware made for the shows but I'm really going to focus on 2 forms for that work. Most likely just mugs(or cups) and tumblers. The trouble I ran into in the spring with the decals was that each form required a new template in Photoshop or Illustrator for the decals. With two forms, I'll only need two templates and I'll be able to experiment more with each image while not worrying about how they'll fit on each piece. I think the long term solution is still slipcasting cups for the decalware...I actually can't wait to start that. But for now, it's time to keep throwing in the studio to take care of what I do know how to do.

Some basic basketweave patterning on the mugs.

I like this design and I think I'll keep playing around with it...perhaps there's some color in all of that open space?

I threw a dozen tall soup bowls this morning.

I thought I would try some larger porcelain bowls(9 pounds).

Some even larger ones may appear on the table tomorrow.

Hurricane Earl whimpered through the Cape last week but today we're feeling the effects of Tropical Storm Hermine and it's been absolutely pouring here today and is supposed to continue on through Thursday. Good thing....we need the rain down here.

Batter Bowls

Still working on the porcelain stuff. Along with the switch to electric firing is the switch to porcelain. I've always dabbled with it but it's an adjustment to have it be my only clay. I'm starting to enjoy it a little more and the forms are starting to come together. I made a few batter bowls the other day and they got handled up today.
The clay doesn't stay put like I'm used to with stoneware so hanging these handles upside down is letting gravity work with me rather than against me. We'll see how much strain was put on those microscoping little particles once the drying begins. I'm hoping they stay put.

Today is my half day of work because of a ridiculously overscheduled afternoon for the kids....of course, they all go in different directions. At some point I'm hoping to make it back here after dinner for a productive evening. We'll have to test the nighttime commute at some point. That will most likely be tested as we get closer to a deadline. I have a few things scheduled for the fall but they all seem distant now.

Dry! Please Dry!

It's incredibly damp(and cool) out here on the Cape.  I'd like to get this bisque loaded but my pots aren't drying.  I may have to wait on a few of these for another bisque and just finish loading with what I have ready.  I would like to get all of the plates through so it's going to be an awfully long soak in the kiln to dry things out....not worth the risk with the pitchers and teapots.

I posted these plate/bowls earlier but I like the way they looked stacked to dry. 

Here are some of the pitchers....

Glaze Tong Fail

I knew there was a reason why I didn't use glaze tongs very often....

The Porcelain Bowl/Faceting/Glaze Tong combo will not be occurring again anytime soon.

It seems as though almost everything is getting a coat or two of celadon glaze on it.  It's going on 3 different clay bodies with a variety of slip/design combos underneath so hopefully it's not too overwhelming to see that much of one glaze in a kiln.  

I was hoping to fire tomorrow but it looks like I may have to put it off until after school vacation week.  We're off to Austin on Saturday via NY on Friday.  

We begin our house search on Monday! 

Bowls and Plates....Bowls and Plates

I know that I've been a very, very bad potter/blogger recently.  I'm trying to make up for it by posting a bunch this morning as I hang out with Clarita.  Maybe that makes me a distracted father though.  Oh...the conflict.

Regardless, I'm just trying to catch up on posts that I've been meaning to make for a while.  I've been working solely in porcelain so far this year but I need to make a few things in stoneware this weekend.  Today will be spent throwing some more dinner plates in porcelain and probably a few mugs as well.  Then, it's off to the iron-bearing clay later today or tomorrow....I need to load a bisque or I won't have any room on shelves....or I can clean off that one set of shelves that is holding junk.  I think that loading a bisque will be easier.

It seems as though I've only been making bowls, cups and plates recently.  I usually gravitate to the more vertical forms so it's been an interesting change of pace.  Perhaps it's a fear of porcelain that has been bringing these forms out.

Below are a few pics.  

Serving Bowl with cut foot.

another serving bowl with cut foot

here are some square dinner plates

this is another dinner plate....I wanted to try some honduran pot deco on one.  I love it but I think it is meant for a serving platter.  Personally, I think it's a little much to look at every day with food on top.  Any thoughts?

Can't Stop Fluting

Those skate punks among us may get my reference to a NOFX song in the title.  I've been reconnecting with my indie-rocker self in the studio listening to Sirius' XMU.  It's been much more fun than listening to Mickey Mouse and Hannah Montana during carpool.

Below are a few more images of some work from the last few days.  

I made a few fluted soup bowls.
Here is a close-up.
Here are a few squared and fluted bowls.  They were made with 2lbs of clay.
And....here's a close-up.

I have one last big bowl to trim tonight.  Tomorrow is going to be spent cleaning up the studio and packing.  We're off to Houston on Thursday for the Holidays.  I'm not sure what kind of blogging I'll be doing from the road.  It will probably be something but most likely not pottery-related.  

Evangelina and I are off to Austin on Saturday for a couple of days to start looking at houses and neighborhoods.  I'm also going to see if I can figure out some areas to rent studio space.  We've been talking about the move for so long it has always seemed so distant but we're starting to get to the reality of it all.

More Bowls, More Fluting

It's getting addictive....

This one is a nice low open mixing bowl.  Everything seems to be getting a cut foot and some flutes along the way.
Here's a taller bowl made with 6lbs of clay.  I usually never keep track of how much clay I use during each throwing cycle but this time I am. Mostly because I'm trying to get these pots ready for Baltimore wholesale.

Mixing Bowls

I've been wanting to make mixing bowls for a while and that's what I did the past couple of days.  Most of them are squared and will get my wax, slip, incised slip treatment.  I really wanted to reference your standard mixing bowl with these.  Then yesterday my delightful friend Abigail posted this on her blog which led me to make some small mixing bowls that are really as basic as it gets....except for some reason I fluted them.  I think that it's something that I've done less than 5 times in my life.

Anyways...I'm curious about it and I may do a few more larger ones.  These are all about 3lbs each.  The first one is round with a cut foot.

These 2 are squared...again...about 3lbs of clay.

And...these are squared and will get the wax/slip combo....I may need to come up with a shorthand for that decorating style.

PS

I mistakenly posted this with just the images so this post may appear more than once in your inbox.  Sorry.

Progress

I had a great day yesterday.  Actually, it was a great few days.  We had a great weekend with the kids, a nice little BBQ feast on Saturday to celebrate with a few friends and we even made it through about half of "Bolt" yesterday evening.  For Javi, who is terrified of movies, half of the movie is some major progress.  Of course, the movie started out much scarier than we thought it would so he didn't exactly get to ease into it. Hopefully it wasn't so bad that he'll avoid going to the theater again.  I doubt it since he hasn't stopped talking about the half of the movie that he did see.  It's almost like he enjoyed it.

Back to pots....

I had a good day in the studio today.  Finished up a few things that I didn't get to do over the weekend and I threw a bunch of squared serving bowls.  I'm going to try and head in shortly to make a few more things but I think I may need to catch up on some sleep so it may not happen.

Here are a few recent pics....

These are the squared vases that I made the other day.  Waxed, slipped and ready to dry out for a bisque.

This is a little squared bowl.  I think it was about 3lbs of clay.  I like the little cut away foot.  I like it better than the footed bowls below...

I made this before the one up above.  As I said...I think that I like other cut foot better.  I think it looks more stable and solid although, we'll see once all is glazed and done....I"m still playing around with this "new to me" form.  I do like how they'll relate to the smaller bowls that I made at the end of the last cycle.  Perhaps the small ones need feet as well.

I made 8 of these 5lb bowls today.  A mix of taller like these and lower, wider ones.  They'll all have cut feet and the incised slip like the first bowl.  

Tomorrow should be another good day in the studio....hopefully I'll have some pics at some point tomorrow to prove it.

Latest Firing

Back to Pots...Really.

I have a table full of finished mugs.  I started out this cycle deciding to make mostly larger pieces.  Large vases, large bowls, large platters and then something happened and my scale shrunk back down.  I have a nice variety of small, medium and large pieces now.  So...I'm glad that I didn't stick to my game plan.

I'm looking for some energy to start glazing for this next kiln-load.  I have the final, very damp bisque soaking right now and will fire that off later tonight.  I haven't really started glazing yet...I've just been staring blankly at the bisqueware on tables and shelves all afternoon.

I really like how everything turned out so I basically see almost everything getting a thick coating of celadon again and hoping for the best.  So....tonight will be a prep session....waxing, clearing shelves and the like and getting ready to really glaze tomorrow....hopefully.  I do need this next round of pots for the show so I need to get that motivation back soon.  I'm going with the theory that this will be like painting...the prep work takes some time and isn't fun but the actual glazing will go quickly and then I can load up quickly.

Here are a couple pics of my table of mugs.