End of a long day

I have finished dinner and am sitting down to see what has gone on in the world today.  My day consisting of rising at 4:20 and getting to the studio by 5:15.  Joan had gotten there at 5 and got us started.  She had to leave for gallery duty at 9ish, leaving Lorraine and I to take us to the end.

It was a long day.  We checked the kiln every 30 minutes, sometimes every 15 as we went through body reduction and as we closed in on our goal of Cone 10.  (I apologize to all my non-potter followers for my use of technical terms, but just too tired to explain them or find links at the moment. Suffice to say these are critical junctures in the firing process.)  In between checking temperature and cones and making adjustments to gas and air, I threw some pots.  Nine pitchers in all.

After a while, there was a nice rhythm: center the clay, achieve desired height, check the kiln, come back to the wheel, shape and alter, remove from wheel, center clay, check the kiln, repeat.  But by 3pm, I couldn’t touch clay anymore.  My mental and physical acuity was waning.  Good thing the gas was to full tilt and further adjustments weren’t necessary.  The last two hours seemed to drag on forever.  But every time we returned to kiln I was amazed to see the flame, especially when the coppers started flashing, creating a beautiful green flame.  It is an awesome process, in which gain respect for the fact that potters have been doing this in some form for thousands of years.

One never knows if the firing was good until you open the kiln.  But all signs are that this should be good.  We had a good steady climb and never lost it (stagnate or reversing temperature).  Reduction appeared moderate.  When we shut the kiln down and closed it down after clearing, we had lots of high fives and happy dances.  I am glad to be home, sated on food and firing.  Now to do this all over again next week in Baltimore.

p.s. sorry no pics, but I will post the kiln opening, as well as next week’s wood firing which has a lot more action.

Loading the Gas Kiln

My primary firing method has been with an electric kiln because that is what my schedule has permitted. I have good results with the electric kiln and have recently been experimenting with spraying which has opened a myriad of possibilities.  But as I wrote recently, I am being lulled back to high-fire and reduction.

Today, with the help of Lorraine Oerth and Joan Ulrich, I loaded the gas kiln at the Art League.  Joan and I loaded the back in the morning, and then Lorraine and I completed loading this afternoon.  It took about 2 hours total.

Before leaving we lit the pilots and made sure they stayed on.  I am currently baking my chocolate zucchini bread to nourish us during the day.  I will rise at 4:30 a.m. tomorrow to get an early start as we are cranking the gas at 5:30 and should be done in 12 to 13 hours.   This will be the first time I have fired this kiln and I am excited.  Hope I can sleep.

Inspiration Monday: November 9, 2009

Another Monday, another piece of metal work.  (Should I start calling these Metal Mondays?).

This week I am inspired by Washington D.C. jewelry artist Analya Cespedes. These rings are too chunky for my fingers, but I still find them elegant.  I like the repetition in pattern, and the element of surprise with an off colored nugget.  This is also another interesting use of negative space, which lends to the elegant nature of these rings.

Analya Cespedes

Wood-Fired Update and Going with the Flow

I laugh at life.  It is so funny at times . . . even when it makes you want to pull out your hair.

Yesterday I got a call from Matt, my mentor and wood-firing partner.  As you know from previous posts, the firing we were to do together last weekend was canceled.  Much stress, doubt and frustration followed.  Matt had another firing scheduled for the 20th, but it was for the bulk of his own work and his students. I then organized a gas firing with my studio mates so I could fire my work that was to go in the wood kiln, since much of it was already glazed for high-fire.  Matt’s call yesterday brought news that he had space for my work in the wood kiln, maybe even two slots.  Woohoo and oh sh#&.  Will I have enough work particularly in light of the gas firing the weekend before?  Who cares.  Just do it. Right?

I have built my year around electric firing and working on my glazes and getting the right combinations to fit my forms.  Of course, I am always refining.  And I have always intended to have two lines of my work: one mid-range electric with colorful glazes and the other high-fired with earthy, variegated surfaces. I just thought I would be more methodical about it. Instead, I feel like I am in this whirlwind of kiln roulette – spin the wheel and watch the pots go round and round.  Where will they land? electric? gas? wood? no one knows.

I realize that my fellow potter friends don’t really have to deal with the issues I have experienced these last two weeks because they have made their choice of firing method. The breadth of firing and glaze possibilities I have available available to me is simultaneously a blessing and a curse.  I know I need to select a few combinations of glazes and firing techniques and stick with them to tighten my body of work.  But it is like being a kid in a candy shop at times.  I want it all and choosing is hard.

Over the next few days, I will be resorting my pots (again) and trying to create a thread of consistency from this chaos. I have asked my gas firing mates to make more work and bring others in (the more the merrier right?) so I can create a balance in my body of work between electric, gas and wood.  Barring any further change in plans, I will be documenting both firing processes and results here so you can let me know if I succeeded in creating clarity out of chaos.

It’s Only Clay 2009

For those who can visit Bemidji, Minnesota in the next month, I encourage you to visit the Bemidji Community Art Center.  They are hosting the 7th annual It’s Only Clay National Juried Ceramics Competition and Exhibition.  This year’s juror is Richard Breshnahan of St. John’s pottery.  Past jurors have included: Linda Christianson, Jeff Oestreich, Robert Briscoe, Bill Gossman and Bob and Cheryl Husby.

The juried show and exhibit is open November 6th through December 19.  The show includes my soda fired vessel shown below.  This pot was made during a workshop at La Meridiana Ceramics school in Tuscany with Gay Smith.

More information on the show can be found here.  Please post your impressions on this blog if you attend.

Wood-Fired Pin-Up Girl and the Humor of the Kiln Gods

It has been a rough week.  Last Monday I found out that the wood firing I had planned for for months wasn’t happening.  I had 5 plastic totes of bisque ware (much of it glazed) with no kiln home.  It wasn’t until Thursday that I was able to recover enough from my disappointment to open the totes, sort through the work and create a plan.

Part 1 of the plan is to fire the glazed work in our studio’s gas reduction kiln in mid-November.  It will be a group of us and should be great fun, sans the ash.

Part 2 of the plan is to move all the unglazed work through the 3 electric kilns that support the Art League school.  Great . . . until two of them went down on Friday.  Aargh.  I was really feeling like the kiln gods were working against me. We got one fixed on Saturday and I spent two days loading, firing and unloading kilns to clear the backlog of work that was piling up in our kiln room.  The work was therapeutic, but my disappointment was still palpable.

As if an omen to pull me out of my funk and remind me not to give up on wood firing, I learned this morning that the pitcher below was selected as the August pot in Potters Council’s Wood-fired calendar for 2010.  To see the entire calendar or purchase your own copy, go to the Potters Council Store.

Inspiration Monday: November 2, 2009

Welcome to the second installment of Inspiration Monday.  This week takes me back to metalwork – my number two source of inspiration after nature uninterpreted.

This week I am featuring the work of Washington D.C. jewelry artist Gail Friedman.  I met Gail in June and just fell in love with her work.  I am also the proud owner of one of her cocoa pod pendants, pictured below. These pendants (which can be worn vertically or horizontally) were inspired by a cocoa pod.  They incorporate wonderful texture and a change in patina, as well as including interesting use of negative space.  I always get compliments when I wear my pod.  A great interpretation of the natural world.

Gail Friedman cocoapod series

Have an inspiring Monday!

Delaying the Atmosphere

As I wrote last week, I was planning on doing a wood and salt firing at Baltimore Clayworks this coming weekend.  Because of a scheduling snafu, we are not firing.

I am just rolling with the punches as best I can.  But that doesn’t mean that I am not disappointed.  I have 5 plastic bins of bisque-ware ready to go.  About half of it wasn’t glazed yet, so no terrible loss of time there.  About 1/3 of it is glazed in yellow salt however.  So if I can’t get those pieces into a hi-fire kiln before Thanksgiving (preferably salt), I am going to have to wash them off and reglaze and fire in an electric kiln or hold them back for another day.  But some of them are my most favorite pieces.  I can’t even open the bins because I know I will get socked with the disappointment.  I always suffer from having an idea in mind of how the pots will turn out (often to be initially disappointed with the results). But this is disappointment on the other end – really knowing that they won’t turn out how I had imagined.

This is where having the day job really helps.  In a few hours, I will be at my desk worrying about other things.  The bins of bisque-ware will still be there.  But for right I can keep a lid on my disappointment and deal with it in a few days.

Inspiration Mondays

Mondays always seem to be tough days to get motivated.  For me, it is the end of 3 intense studio days, while I return to my day job.  So I am always looking for some inspiration.

As my regular readers know, I am mostly inspired by nature.  However, I also look at other art work, and not just ceramics.  I am particularly drawn to metal work for my inspiration (even though I have no interest in working in that medium).  I also look at glass objects photography, wood work, etc.

Since I am sure I am not the only one looking for creative inspiration on a Monday, I thought I would share images that get my creative juices moving.  So welcome to my launch of “Inspiration Mondays”.  Here I will feature images that get my mind racing about how to continue improving my ceramic forms.  Maybe they will inspire something creative in you.  Or maybe they will just remind you that there are beautiful things in our world.

For this inaugural Inspiration Monday, I am featuring a pair of earrings by Etsy artist – April Kawaoka.

I have been following April’s work since I joined Etsy in December 2008.  I find that I am drawn to the lines in her work and how natural they seem.  Yes they are earrings, but that doesn’t immediately jump out at me.  I see caterpillars or worms (hey worms are our friends), or a snail’s shell (not our friends, although I believe every creature has its place, just not in my garden). I also see the unfurling of a fern leaf.  There is just so much going on in this very simple design.

Enjoy, and have an inspiring Monday!

Going back to the atmosphere

It has been two years since I last fired in a wood fueled kiln (see sample pot at bottom of this post).  In the interim, I have been firing in electric and working on my cone 6 (around 2200 degrees F) glazes.  Occasionally, I would throw a pot into the gas kiln.  But mostly I have stuck with what was predictable. I haven’t been interested in the unpredictability of a wood kiln.

But then I went to Italy and fired in a soda kiln.  This particular kiln was fired with liquid propane gas to a temperature of around 2377 degrees F.  Then toward the end of the firing, we introduced soda (in the form of sodium bicarbonate) to the kiln which gave a wonderful luster to our pots and activated the flashing agents in our slips as you can see from this piece below.  The orange color is uneven from where the flame and soda interacted with the pot surface.  The grey deposits are where the soda built up on the pot.

The results that come out of a soda kiln, or any kiln where you are using the kiln atmosphere  to achieve a specific result, are beautiful and unpredictable. Soda is not the only atmosphere additive.  Potters will also add salt to a kiln, which can yield a surface texture similar to an orange.  Still others simply fire with wood and let the flying ash land on the pots in the kiln, creating wonderful patterns and textures.

I think of atmospheric kilns like playing golf.  You get one great pot out of an atmospheric kiln (like that one great drive or putt), and you keep coming back for more trying to replicate that pot (or shot). But like my experimentation with golf, I took a hiatus from atmospheric firing. While I liked the results from the wood firing in 2007, the process requires a lot of work and I was making so little work at that time that I was not willing to commit to a process with such variable results.  But my experience with soda firing in Italy hooked me again.  I had to go back for more.  The unpredictability was now an enticement, not a source of frustration.

The Washington D.C. metro area doesn’t have a lot of soda firing occurring, but salt and wood kilns are relatively plentiful.  One of the great resources we have in this area is Baltimore Clay Works.  BWC has a two chambered wood fueled kiln, one of which they add salt to (and sometimes soda) at the end of the firing.  Next Friday I will be glazing and loading several of my pots into 1/5th of the BWC’s kiln. We will be firing starting Saturday morning and finish up Sunday morning. We will unload the kiln the following Wednesday.

Because I haven’t fired in this kiln, I am trying to maximize the amount of information I get out of it, without going crazy.  I am using four different clay bodies: Laguna’s B-mix, Standard 306 brown stoneware, Standard Trina Buff white stoneware and Standard 213 porcelain.  I have two atmospheres to work with: salt and wood.  While I have numerous glaze possibilities, I have decided to limit myself to three: yellow salt, oribe and golden shino.  A few weeks ago, I sat on my living room floor with a large sheet of paper and divided it by four (for each clay body), divided those spaces by two (for each chamber), and then again by three (for each glaze).  My studio colleagues chuckled at me for my methodical approach, but I look forward to seeing each of the twenty-four possibilities that will come out of the kiln in early November.

A piece from my last wood firing.

As much work as just preparing for this firing has been, I am excited to be going back to atmospheric firing.  If all goes well, I hope to fire in such a kiln two to three times per year, creating a high fired line of my altered work.  I am also excited to be sharing the experience with you.  Assuming I will have internet access next weekend, I hope to  post pictures from Friday’s glazing, wadding and loading day by Saturday morning and then pics of the actual firing by Sunday.  Then the unloading and results by November 6th. Stayed tuned.