Kiln Loaded

I got the kiln loaded today before lunch. It went pretty quickly since I had prewadded most everything. I will light the burners tonight and fire off tomorrow. I loaded fairly loose in anticipation of using mostly soda and less salt.

My clay is coming in out of the racks. I am looking forward to getting back to making next week. After seeing all the great pots on my travels I am really inspired. I am going to try some new large jar shapes as well as some faceted bottles and vases. I have been jotting down my 'to make list' over the past couple days.

Impact

I am slowing getting back to work here. My clay is coming out of the racks. I fired a bisque yesterday. I am planning on firing the salt/soda kiln later in the week unless I decide to just keep making pots and fire twice in early September. I don't know yet.

My friend Tom wrote asking me how I was impacted by my pottery trip and what effect, if any, it will have on my work or way of thinking.

First off, I've never traveled much by myself. Actually this is the first long distance trip I've ever done alone. So just in doing that I feel like I have more confidence in that I am capable of going off by myself. I did have times when I felt like I should have been doing more or spending my time in some 'exciting traveler' way. But I did what I wanted, when I wanted and that's fine. I feel like I got way out of my comfort zone by going alone. I made an effort to talk to strangers and to relax and let things happen. I am one who tends to 'plan, plan, plan', often I try to plan things I have no control over. So going with the flow was fun and scary for me at the same time. And I survived.

As far as pottery goes, I don't know that I am going to do much different in my work. In visiting all the potters I saw that everyone is working very hard to make a living. Some do shows, some sales from home, exhibits and often some form of teaching. No one seems to have all their eggs in one basket. I feel like I am on the right track. Linda's advice was 'keep making'.
I did come away inspired to continue to make simple functional pots. Seeing the work of Mackenzie from the past 50 years was inspiring in that most of those pots were modest pots, many of which had been used in peoples home. There were 'show pots' too. Bigger jars, platters, bottles, vases. Again eggs in different baskets, but none of these were pots that were loud, or complicated in any technical way. They were deep in their simplicity and history. That is inspiring to me.

I would like to pay more attention to my lifestyle. Slowing down is important. Eating well, exercising, reading, listening to music, taking time to play and relax. I'd like to draw more and cook more. I feel like I am pretty involved here in the community, I'd like to get folks out to the pottery to my home sales. I am planning on continuing to teach at Clayworks and I'd like to teach some workshops. The Circle of Eight is going strong, and I think that avenue is going to help all of us with our careers.

So for now that's how I feel. Maybe other things will come up or change. We'll see.

Visiting with Linda

My visit with Linda Christianson was really wonderful. She and her family welcomed me into their home and Linda took lots of time to spend with me. When I arrived Linda showed me around the new studio that she and her husband Jeff have been working on for the past few years. It is nearing completion and it is a wonderful space. Linda's two chamber, bourry box, wood kiln is finished and has been fired 3 times since the spring. Her studio space is almost finished too. We discussed all the options for lighting. Jeff has a wood working space and a nice area for hot glass.

Over dinner preparation we discussed favorite radio stations, books, pots and caught up on what has been going on since we last saw one another. I spent the night out in the studio and it was a beautiful cool night. I got up once very late and walked outside to look up into sky. It was a dark clear night and there were a million stars visible over head. The next morning after breakfast we looked at images of pots on my laptop and pictures from home. Cecilia, Linda and Jeff's daughter, joined us out on the porch. She's grown so much since I was there last. The day went on and I got to check out some nice pots that Linda had in her cupboard from the UK. We used a nice bowl of Lisa Hammond's for mixing up a fruit salad for lunch and Linda showed me her favorite bowl to use for cereal, one by Micki Schloessingk. These are two of my favorite potters so it was a treat to see the pots.

After lunch I selected some of Linda's pots to purchase and bring back home. I got a nice cereal/soup bowl, a square mug, and a slab tray. I would have loved to have had more but I can only get so much on the plane.

We ended the visit by me giving Linda and Cecilia a little ride up to the mailbox in my rental car, a PT Cruiser, which everyone said looked like a little German car. Linda marched up and down the drive like a soldier as I drove off. She made me laugh more than once while I was there. She's a very kind and generous person and I am grateful to know her.

Minnesota Cont.

I am back home now. I wanted to post on the last few days of my trip after my visit at Warren's. Below is a shot from the banks of the St. Croix river in Stillwater. I went down one evening and enjoyed some music along with all these folks. It was nice to just relax, everywhere I went on my trip felt comfortable and homelike. On Thursday I headed up towards Taylor's Falls. On the way I stopped by to visit Guillermo Cuellar's studio. He was in Peru (and thankfully uneffected by the earthquake), however his wife Laurie showed me around and I bought a nice bowl and yunomi. Guillermo has worked on and off with Warren through the years and I really like his work.

After that I stopped by Franconia Sculpture Park. It was nice to just hang out there and walk around the fields looking at all the art work. There are several residents working there. The big farm house is for their housing and there is a big work yard with hoists, welders, and all kinds of stuff I don't know anything about.

I also visited Taylor's Falls. It's a nice little town with shops and resturants etc. There I went into Interstate State Park and climbed around on the rocks and enjoyed myself up high above the river. After a couple of hours I headed in to town and had coffee before going off to see the potter Linda Christianson.

I'll write about my trip to Linda's later so check back in .

From Minnesota

I am having a great time here in Minnesota. The Mackenzie exhibit in Rochester was amazing. The space was huge. There was no photography allowed so I have no images to share. The pots were all displayed on eight tables that were about 8' x 8' and knee high. There were also lines on pots on the walls, jars, platters, bottles, and serving plates. It was so cool to see pots from the last 50 years or so all brought together. I could tell many had been in regular use and some had been repaired from chips or breaks. On entering the exhibit space I was confronted by a large white wall with 3 long inset shelves each holding 7 yunomi. This was a dramatic display too. There were large photos on the wall of Warren working and images from the past. There was a beautiful display of a dinnerware set made early on (I'll check on the date) and decorated by Alix. Also 3 Hamada pots and 2 Leach pots from Warren's collection.

Yesterday I started the day by going to visit Warren for a few hours. I had written and called weeks ago so I was expected. I was greeted by Nancy, Warren's wife, and also by Joan Mondale who had just arrived also. Joan and I went down to the workshop and talked to Warren while he made yunomi. It was a great visit, made easier for me (I'm somewhat shy) by Joan's presence. We all chatted and Warren and Joan worked along until lunchtime. We went to the house for a nice lunch with Nancy who was also stewing plums for jelly and cooking Japanese eggplant for a later meal. After lunch it was time for me to move on and I headed into the city to the Northern Clay Center.

Later, I drove west to Randy Johnston's pottery in River Falls. Yes, I know I'm going all over the place. That's the great thing about traveling alone and having no agenda. I got to Randy's around 4 and made a selection from the showroom. I walked up to the workshop and who did I find there with Randy? Warren. It was sort of funny. They were busy talking about glaze materials, so I talked with Jan, Randy's wife and a great potter. Anyhow I didn't stay long after Warren left as it was late in the day and Randy and Jan were preparing to go off to teach at Anderson Ranch for two weeks.

That's it for now. I'll post more later. I have a busy day planned today, I am heading north. I have one more day tomorrow that is pretty wide open. I feel like after today I will be more than ready to get back home.

Studio

Here are some images from the studio. Pots waiting to be bisqued or glazed. I am getting my things together today to go to Minnesota. All this stuff will be waiting for me when I get home. I'll have a bisque and then fire the salt kiln hopefully around the 24th. I may post some while I am away so check back and see.

Clay mixing

This morning I mixed two racks of clay. Each will yield around 250 lbs of usable clay. You can see it's mixed really wet, that way all the clay particles get wet and it makes for great clay. I'll cover each rack with tin and it will take 10-14 days for the clay to be ready to come in. I store it in big trash cans and pug it when I am ready to use it.

Beating the Heat

It was over 100 degrees here again today. Early this morning I did some yard work but soon retired indoors to the studio to tidy up and make some cone packs and basically do little else. I have managed some computer work and went to town for some odds and ends in anticipation for my trip to Minnesota.

Here is a picture of Sarah from Wednesday when we attended a wedding at South Mountain State Park. My little wild flower had to get in the river and cool off. I should have done the same but I was a bit over dressed in slacks.

I am presently enjoying a banana smoothie. Here's how to make one: Freeze two bananas (peel before freezing). In a blender combine the bananas, 10 oz or so of soy or rice milk, a couple table spoons, more or less of chocloate syrup, and some honey if desired. Blend until smooth, you may have to add more liquid. Drink slowly to avoid brain freeze.

Tomorrow morning I am heading to Charlotte to help my friend Julie with some things at Clayworks and I will also pick up some materials to mix clay. Hopefully I'll do that Sunday. That way it can be in the racks while I am away.

All for now. Have a good Friday evening.

Thursday. Already.

This week is flying by. I feel like I am in the Twilight Zone or something, the time is passing and I have no recall of what I've been doing. It must be this heat.

Yesterday I had an old friend from school come by, I've not seen him in over 15 years. He lives with his family in Orange Co. California. It was good to catch up.

Sarah and I attended the wedding of our good friend Sally Jacobs late yesterday afternoon. Sally is an awesome painter and just finished her MFA. She's lived in Italy, and Charleston, SC before ending up here. She now has the position of the head of the art dept. at Cleveland Community College here in Shelby. I am glad she'll be here a bit longer. Congrats to Sally and Scott!

We got to sit with Bob Trotman and his wife Jane last night at the reception. Bob is an awesome sculptor. It was good to get to know him a bit more.

I am out of clay, so I will be mixing some glaze today and firing a bisque. Here are the last pots I made to clear out the clay bin. I'll bisque again when I get home from Minnesota and have a salt firing soon thereafter.

Monday

I didn't realize I hadn't posted since Wednesday. So here is a quickie.
Over the weekend we painted our renovated area, there was some question about one of the colors so that set us back alittle but all is decided now.
I cleaned the whole house on Friday and baked a cake. I also went to the Asian market to get some supplies for a special dinner. This was all for Sarah of course. Her birthday is today but we've been celebrating all weekend. After painting all day on Sat. we had dinner with some friends. She's had a good birthday I think.

I made pots today and finished up a few things. Sorry no pics. I am out of clay for all practical purposes. I'll get mixing towards the end of the week and also get a bisque fired. I leave to go to Minnesota next week and I am getting excited about that.

It was 96 degrees here today and dry as can be. The air quality is awful and we are both suffering with sinus problems.

So that's the long and short of it. More later.

Making Pots

Yesterday was pretty much shot after I went to the Arts Council. I spent the rest of the day working downstairs knocking a hole in the floor to get rid of the old water inlet pipe and then repairing the hole.

So today I got back in the workshop to finish up some things from Monday. These tall footed bowls got cut. The ones on the left will get birds tomorrow. Small ovals got bottoms and handles today. Same with this big oval.
The board of spoon jars on the left got slipped. These are quick and easy pots that I sell a lot of. The board of cups in the middle got handled and slipped and I made another board of cups today (right)
I am still waiting on some bigger bowls to dry for footing, so maybe get to those tomorrow. Sarah called at lunch and I was happy to get out of the shop to go out with her for a bite to eat. I miss having her at home.

My work day ended at 4pm in order for me to get ready to drive to Charlotte for our Circle of Eight meeting. I am looking forward to seeing my clay pals.

Post Firing

I had a very productive day in the studio Monday morning. I also spent time going over old kiln logs, books, photos, etc trying to figure out what to do next time. I get a bit obsessed I must say when things go wrong. I am planning on firing some pots in some other people's salt and soda kilns to see how my clay and slip react.

We are moving forward on the renovation since the drywall is all finished . We will work on the floor this weekend and get started painting soon.

I have to go help install a show at the Arts Council this morning, and then come back and do some minor work downstairs and hopefully finish up some of yesterday's pots.

Thanks for checking in.

Oh yeah I found out that I got accepted into the American Craft Council Show in Charlotte. The date is early November. I'll post more on that later.

Unloaded

I unloaded the kiln today. I have mixed feelings about it because it was a pretty mixed up firing. I had some pretty nice pots and quite a few that I was not happy with at all. I am struggling with knowing what's going on with my firings. It seems I have lost the consistancy that I once could rely on from this kiln. Disappointed as I am with some of the pots I am raring to go and get back in the studio to make for the next load so I can try and work it out. Salt/soda firing is certainly not for the weak at heart. I have to say that just when I think I know what is going on then something new comes up. My clay test was not very successful. My slip did not fit well. So here are some of the pots. First up are a couple of jugs/pitchers. A large oval baker.
These bowls are new. I like the contrast of the yellow slip interior to the exterior.
Here is the problem that I am running into time and time again, dryish, rough, dark, scum. It happens mainly in the front of the kiln where it is hottest and on the fire face side of the pots. Often the other side of the pot will be just fine.
I keep thinking to myself it is time to rebuild this kiln. I feel like there is so much salt build up on the walls that I am getting this negative effect from early residual salt build up on the pots where they are getting the hottest early on.

July Pots

I was happy with these pasta/salad dishes. They are a commission and I have a few more to fire. Here are four tankards with pours and dots. This yellow slip is working good in parts of the kiln where my standard flashing slip is having some problems.
Tall footed soup/cereal bowls. These have become a standard form of mine over the past year or so. I do variations on the handles or lugs. These have the slip on the inside and outside which I like (more so than having a shiny glaze on the inside). These pots all have the same slip on them, the variation in color and surface is due to placement in the kiln.

Firing

I loaded the kiln yesterday. There is quite a bit of dinnerware in this load. I need to buy some plate setters, they would save space in the kiln. Anyhow I am firing now and just put the kiln into body reduction. I should be finished sometime around 4:30pm. Below is an image of the front stacks. Here is an image of the back stack and the front getting started. I'll unload on Sunday.

Preparation for Loading

The day before loading the kiln, I clean up around the kiln shed and scrape all the shelves. There is usually a build up of salt on the shelves from the previous firing as well as some bits of wadding. All this gets scraped off and then I blast each shelf with the air hose to get all the dust off. Wadding is made from alumnia hydrate and kaolin, a 50/50 mix. I make up about 10 lbs of this at a time and that lasts me a while. All the pots in the kiln have to sit on little balls of wadding, if they did not the salt glaze may stick the pots to the shelves. It also allows the pots to get some sodium vapour underneath the pots and glaze the bottoms somewhat. I make wads by rolling out a coil of wadding mixture and cutting it into pea sized pieces with my fettling knife. I'll make up 2 batts worth of wadding and that usually is enough to wad all the ware.
If time permits, I'll pre-wad most of the smaller pots before loading. The alternative is to wad as I load the kiln. Here I have applied a little white glue dot where I want the wads and then applied the wadding. If I don't use the glue the wadding will fall off when it dries. Pre-wadding makes loading go a bit faster.

Minnesota Bound!!

I just booked a plane ticket to Minneapolis, Minnesota for the second week in August!! I am stoked. I will be driving down to Rochester, MN to see the Warren Mackenzie exhibit and later on I'll visit Warren's pottery and several other potters who I admire. This will be my second trip to what I consider the pottery mecca of North America. I have been thinking about this trip since May and finally decided to do something good for myself and go. Yea for me!

Omissions

I forgot to mention the Circle of Eight exhibit at the Greenwood Arts Council in Greenwood SC. We will be showing along with two painters, Ruth Martin and Lorry Park. I delivered all the pots to the space on Monday. It's a very nice space and I feel like we'll have a good show. The opening is this Friday, July 27th from 5 till 7 pm. the show will remain up through August. If you are in the area please stop in. I won't be at the opening but Jen Mecca and Amy Sanders will be representing the Circle crew.

I also wanted to mention another potter in my last entry, Jeff Martin is in Boone, NC, one of our favorite places. Jeff found me via my Journal and it turns out I had seen some of his pots at a resturant in Boone, Angelica's. You can visit Jeff's myspace page, there's tons of stuff on there.

Today. Potters.

Today was fairly productive although I didn't make any pots. I really needed to clean up the studio. It was getting way cluttered and junky and that makes me crazy. Looking at it makes me feel like the inside of my head is all messed up. So I tidyed up and swept and felt much more comfortable in there. I mixed some test slip and glaze and finished putting some liners in a couple bakers that I put off yesterday. I am trying out some slips that fit on bisque. It's nice to be able to slip the outside leatherhard, and then come back after the bisque and do the inside. I prefer a slip to a glaze on the insides if I can get away with it. It works best on open forms as the salt vapor needs to get in there and flux the slip and make it turn color. I also finished up the new Harry Potter book today after lunch. That's all I'll say about that in case you are reading it.

I mentioned Scott Cooper a while back. I got an email today directing me to his new journal site. It's really great. Scott's a good potter and writer to boot. Check it out, it looks like his plan is to post weekly. I enjoyed catching up on the past few weeks.

I also made it over to Gay Judson's blog. Gay posts comments to me from time to time but it's taken me until now to get to her site. She's making some good pots and I don't think she hates glazing anymore.

I'll also direct you over to Diana Fayt's blog. Her guest blogger Laura Zindel has a great post there on 'green pots'.

The above image is an oval baker from a few firings ago. (it has a glaze on the inside, not a slip like I was talking about earlier.)

Slack

I have been sort of a slackard lately as far as posting goes. I am feeling a bit guilty, but will try and make up for some it this week. There has been a good deal going on around here, as well as Sarah and I making a trip to the mountains for a family reunion, and having some family visit us here in Shelby. I am at the end of my making cycle for this month ( a bit early), and will hopefully fire the salt kiln over the weekend. I unloaded this bisque yesterday and got the pots glazed that needed it. I reloaded and have another going now. On a personal note, I am struggling with some decisions and true to my nature (or more accurately, my conditioning) I am mostly moving in circles. I have been rather disconnected lately, hence the lack of posts, but I am taking care and hope to do more this week.

I have a few more things to report regarding a Circle of Eight show that is coming up and some fellow bloggers that I want to mention. That will have to wait until later as I need to get the dogs out and on with my day. Stay tuned, hopefully there'll be more later.