Workshop in Taku, 2014. This is what you get when a professional photographer runs wild, and is kind enough to share. Thank you Robert (Brad) Haughie!
The kickwheel conversion is finally finished. Here are some pictures of the flywheel getting put together:
And it was just as easy as that. Many thanks again to Yamaguchi kun for making the flywheel armature!
And here I am taking it out for a spin:
I decided to try out a new form to put in the next firing. A clam shaped dish that is a sort of Karatsu standard. They are nothing special, and pretty much everyone makes them, so there seem to be MANY ways to get from point A to point B.
The first thing I always do when trying out something new, is look through my collection of old Karatsu ware pictures and books, to see if I can find an example, with measurements, of what I want to make. Well, this time around it seems that although everyone seems to be making them now, there are very few examples of this form recorded in Karatsu ware related books. Or at least the ones I have in my studio.
I managed to find the same 5 piece set of old Karatsu Hamaguri dishes (clam shaped dishes) in 3 different publications (above). And, none of them show the bottom of the dish, or a closeup of the folded lip that makes the clam shape. I made a few, tried cutting the lip and overlapping, pulling the lip up and folding over, and a few more things, but all I ended up with were forms that just didn’t click.
Whenever I get stumped, I give my mentor a call. He usually has some advice that gets me out of my hole and gets me back on track. In this case, I asked him if there was some sort of not so obvious ‘trick’ involved in getting the shape right for this particular form. As usual, Tsuruta sensei gave me some very good advice, and even sent me some close up photographs, which helped a lot. So, here’s what I came up with:
Now, I tried doing the bending and folding at various stages of drying and I’m here to tell you that it is best done when they are still sticky wet. I suppose it depends on your clay, but for the stuff we have around here, bending and folding is like asking for fate to show up in your studio with a big baseball bat.
That said, although it folded better when wet, it had a nasty habit of unzipping vertically down the pot 10 minutes later. That’s where the extra blob of clay came in handy. It seems that not only is it decorative, but it also keeps the pot together until it stiffens up a bit. Who knew?!
Honestly, these are my favorite discoveries: when I find a decorative element that is actually not a decorative element at all, but rather an important part of the process cleverly disguised as decoration.
Today the second chamber was finally finished. I’m not going to brick it in yet, since I have probably forgotten something important, and I want quick access if necessary, until the fire is actually lit. Unbricking an rebricking a door would be on my list of less than desirable ways to spend a day.
While the farther stack was packed with more vanilla type blended clay bodies, this front stack is mostly bodies composed entirely of native clay and stone. Some of it got white slip, but it all got the same clear glaze, so I don’t have to guess too much about temp in the rear chamber when I fire.
Below are some pics of brush deco, slip, and loading. I am happier with a lot of the brush work this time around, but some things still just give me fits, like trying to draw long fluid shrimp whiskers on a round pot. Gah! Need more practice…
Today I had a very nice visit from a television station who did a very nice job of filming the studio, as well as conducting an interview with me for a show segment coming up in August. They filmed the studio and kiln, me making a coil and paddle jar, me glazing a bisqued piece of similar form, and also finished pieces which had the same glaze as the demo forms.
All in all, a very thorough job on their part, although I have no idea how they will edit everything down to fit in a 5 minute segment.
I had taken photos of the crew to put up on the blog, but apparently the station prefers not to have behind the scenes images of its projects made public, so I am leaving them out for now.
I will, however, include a few images similar to what may show up on the air in a few weeks. Also, once the show airs and the segment is viewable on the internet, I will post a link to it for all this blog’s viewers.
Today is the first load of bisque aimed at the fall firing of the wood kiln. About 28 ware boards worth of pots, I really tried to get as much packed in as possible, to maximize the gas used.
I don’t pack glaze firings very tight because I want the calories getting around to everything, but for bisque I’m not too picky.
700C – 750C is my usual peak temp, I like the ware to be very absorbent for glazing, however the resulting ware is quite fragile and needs careful handling.
This time around there are quite a few slab plates of various shapes and sizes, which I am a bit worried will crack. These are stacked on spacers, then more spacers between stacked plates, because I don’t want to take any chances with cracking. The rest of everything is pretty safe, so packed and stacked without too much thought other than to get as much in as possible.
