what i made during my fourth ceramics class
i had scheduled myself to spend this hour in the ceramics studio, but i didn't want to go all the way there and find that my bisqueware wasn't ready, so i've decided to push that time to tomorrow and instead publish the latest in the what i made in my ceramics class series. i'm currently past the halfway point of my third wheel throwing class, but these are the final pieces from last semester's "color expressions and surface techniques" hand-building course.
here's what i made during my fourth ceramics class.
the abstract for this class was learning about and using various techniques for adding color to clay. it was a hand-building course, although i threw a few pieces on the wheel during open studio hours, but the primary focus was on the materials added for color expression.
the first couple of classes focused on nerikomi, a japanese term for marbling various color bodies (clay). the square-pattered cup is tear-dropped because i didn't roll a big enough piece for a mug, but i managed to get something out of the cool pattern. our instructor was very generous to keep a box of the different clay bodies on her shelf so we can pick at them during open studio hours, which is how i came to making the bowl with different clay swirls. i love how both pieces came out, and i even got a chance to do more marbling in my current wheel class and went into the session with this experience.
i threw a few other pieces on the wheel to have available for future lessons and to test out different glazes. i made another travel mug, trying to go larger and lighter which i did. don't ask me where the handle went, i don't know! i just glazed over the ghost of it and i like how the broken ends give a bit of friction needed to hold it. the small vessel was from my prior class that i saved to test different glazes on and i do not like how it turned out at all! but we learned later in the semester about overglazes which are like acrylic paints that you can then bake onto a glazed piece in a standard oven. i'm going to get some to try to improve this vessel.
here are inside both vessels. the double-purple one came out so cool. i painted black underglaze shapes onto the greenware and sgraffito-carved the grids. as bisqueware, i dipped each half into different purple community glazes - the studio had added that pinkish purple one just in time for me to use.
because our class had a focus on color expression, we had the opportunity to use special glazes that are normally not allowed by the studio because they require different kiln programs than what they typically do. they had a smaller kiln where we could fill it with pieces glazed with special, beautiful crystallizing glaze. i threw on the wheel this kind of tiny cup and saucer set that i then scored and stuck together. the blue crystals look so cool and this dish holds my daily jewelery on my desk.
i hand-made this little dish which mysteriously broke in half while waiting to be fired on the shelf - not an uncommon occurrence in a community studio with tiny shelves and lots of chaos and maybe the same ghost that broke my mug handle. i glazed both pieces anyway and may make them into jewelry or magnets or whatever. maybe i'll paint the edges with gold overglaze to make them look less broken. clearly this class has taught me a lot of finishing techniques to the point that finding a broken piece doesn't faze me.
our instructor was doing a separate workshop for hand-building traditional ceremony matcha bowls and she generously did the workshop for us as a play test. i love how mine came out - it was in black clay and i did a bluish green transparent underglaze on the inside. next to it are a couple porcelain doodads i painted with various metal washes she taught us about - cobalt, copper and iron. i use this as a little incense holder.
so i'm currently in wheel 2 making bowls and bigger pieces, and i've already used some techniques from this color class to start creating a story around how my pieces fit together. i'm feeling really good about how big i'm throwing and how i'm adding color to everything. after this semester i'm taking a sculpting class and then i plan to become a studio member and learn by doing on my own for a bit, because at that point i'll have absorbed the teachings of a wide variety of teachers and techniques. i can hardly wait to show you what's on my shelf as i type this!
xoxo jenn
p.s. i know that every post i say i'll list of some of my pieces soon, but i plan to make them into proper candles, which will need to wait until the weather gets a bit cooler so that they survive shipping in the intense heat we've been in the northeast.