Ceramics 1: January 2015

Thursday, January 29, 2015

Coil Pot Inspiration

An artist on Deviant Art created a bird coil pot. They creatively used coils to form a wing. I found it very interesting. The pot was not a common pot that was all symmetrical. It placed emphasis on the wing by having it stick out. Perhaps, when I make my own coil pot, I don't necessarily have to make it symmetrical.

Peter Garrand is a ceramic artist. One of the things he specializes in is coil pots. He makes swirls out of them and combines the swirls together to for a pot. In my pot, I want to integrate that with other coiling techniques to form a pot.

Pinterest, again, has a lot of interesting coil pot designs created by different artists. Some of them have themes, such as an ocean/undersea theme. Others are more elegant, and other ones have more swirls.

Coil Pot Introduction

Objectives:

To experiment with the coil method to create a pot

Materials:

Clay
Sponge
Watered-down clay (slip)
Ceramic tools

Procedure:

Roll a slab of clay out
Use a circular object to trace out the base
Wedge a piece of clay to remove any air in it
Stretch the clay out, then roll it out into coils in the thickness you want it to be
When connecting the coils, score and slip
Smooth out the inside and/or outside to connect the clay together

Tuesday, January 27, 2015

Pinch Pot Process (January 27, 2015)

I spent a lot of time trying to smooth the clay out, especially in the tight nooks and crannies. I attempted to incise a design onto the clay, but in my opinion, it just made it worse. So, I covered it up with clay and smoothed it out. I continued to smooth the clay out. The eyes were kind of lopsided, so I had to poke new ones. Lastly, when everything was finished, I poked holes onto my animal sculpture to help the drying process. I had two main balls of clay, one for the head and one for the body. For the head, the holes leading into the empty space inside the clay were the eyes. And for the body, I poked a hole in a not as noticeable area. The holes were necessary because trapped air can cause the clay to explode (ceramic golden rule). Then, I left it out to dry. Now, I need to wait for around a week until this piece of greenware gets bone-dry, so that I can put it in the kiln.

attempt to incise

Wednesday, January 21, 2015

Pinch Pot Process (January 21, 2015)

To start off, I first had to wedge the clay to remove any air or trapped bubbles inside (ceramic golden rule). I formed balls of clay and in total, pinched a total of four pots. Two of them were smaller than the other two. I combined the two smaller ones by scoring the sides and applying water to form the head. I did the same with the two larger ones to form the body. I had to be careful to make sure that the clay was no thicker than my thumb (ceramic golden rule). Next, I pinched a trunk from the ball of clay. I squished the head a bit to make the face more angular and less round. Then, I rolled out thick strips of clay for the legs. the front legs appeared to be longer than the back ones (the ones the elephant would be sitting on). I used the clay rolling machine to get an even thickness of clay for the ears. The ears were difficult to form because I was unsure of how elephant ears are shaped.

Once, when I was packing up, I accidentally squirted way too much water on the clay. The next class I worked on it, the clay was too moist and difficult to work with. The ears were really wet. The trunk was very flimsy. From then on, I payed closer attention to the amount of water I squirt on.

When all the pieces were ready, I started to attach them together. I used the score and slip method, where you mark the surfaces of two pieces of clay and use wattered down clay as glue.. I first attached the front legs to the body. Next, I attached the back legs. Then, I attached the ears. I had to carefully figure out a good position for the ears that will show a timid posture/form of the elephant. It was difficult to smooth the clay out after putting the legs and ears on. As I attached the parts, I had to "move the clay around" in those locations. As a result, I left quite a few marks on surfaces that were supposed to be smooth. There were a lot of narrow gaps that I was unable to reach. I tried to smooth it out, but I was making it worse. In the end, I removed the ears, smoothed the clay out, then carefully attached the ears back on. It turned out better.

When i worked on it today, I found out that the elephant trunk was broken. Perhaps, I didn't put the clay in the bag carefully. Or, it could have broken because I squirted too much water, making the trunk unsturdy. But, I repaired it. I hope nothing falls off or breaks off this time. Everytime after I work on a project and am not finished I would wrap it up in a plastic bag (ceramic golden rule) to prevent it form drying up.

Pinch Pot Animal Inspiration

When I was brainstorming about what I wanted to make using the pinch method, I looked through the web to find inspiration. I saw flower pinch pots, animal pots, and intricately designed pots. If I made pots, I thought about having an overall theme for them. I thought about making a nature scene with flowers and a seasons (spring, summer, autumn, winter) theme. I thought about making animals, such as octopuses and elephants. I had a difficult time deciding on what I wanted to do. In the end, I decided to make an elephant.

I wanted the elephant to express an emotion. I was thinking of making it bold and proud or timid and shy. I ended up deciding to make it more timid. I wanted to make a more "cartoon" version of a baby elephant, exaggerating its ears.

I received most of my inspiration from Pinterest. It had a lot of great ideas on how to create and decorate pinch pots. It also had cute ceramic animals.