David Peters operates a ceramics business called David Peters Ceramics located at www.davidpetersceramics.com. He can be contacted via email at localclay@gmail.com regarding his ceramic works. The brief document expresses gratitude without providing further details about the business or ceramics.
Kelly O'Briant is a web developer based in San Francisco. Her website kellyobriant.com serves as her online portfolio, showcasing her skills and experience building responsive websites using modern technologies like HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. Visitors can learn about Kelly's background and view examples of her work on both personal and client projects.
Panel: A Hand in Industry: 40 years of the Arts/ Industry Program at the John Michael Kohler Arts Center
Panelists will share insights drawn from their areas of research from experiments with materials specific to the Arts/Industry residency program to observations about new intersections between industry, design, and handwork. The panel includes a curator, an art historian, and two artists who created significant work in the program.
Alison Ferris
Ann Agee
Ezra Shales
Tom Spleth
The document appears to be an artist statement from Joanna Powell discussing her work. It includes the title "Beauty is a Struggle" and images of Powell's artwork from 2014 including portraits and details from pieces titled "Have Your Best Face Forward", "Sugarbaby, Take Him These Ants Are Gonna Sting Me Sure as the World", "First Impressions Are the Worst", and "A Simple Complicated Truth". The document also includes contact information for Powell and a request to follow her on Instagram.
This document thanks several individuals - Ashley Lugo, Maribel Lugo, Gilberto Lugo, Shannon Goff, Liz Quackenbush, Chris Staley, Paul Donnelly, George Timock, Cary Esser, and Jay Spalding - for their contributions to an unspecified effort or event.
Earlham College provided the artist's undergraduate education from 1996-2000. Further studies included earning an MFA at the University of Iowa from 2007-2010 and attending The Archie Bray Foundation in Helena, Montana from 2011-2012. The artist creates assemblages out of found materials like ceramic, luster, rubber and wood that seek purpose and beauty within natural conditions of disorder. Examples include Assemblage 32 from 2011 and Assemblages 61 & 52 from 2014 and 2013.
David Robinson received an MFA from the University of Nebraska Lincoln in 2004 and a BFA from the University of Massachusetts-Dartmouth in 1999. He creates large-scale ceramic sculptures and installations that often incorporate mixed media. His works reference his experiences living and creating art in places like Rhode Island, Wyoming, Texas, and on Martha's Vineyard. He is influenced by artists like Jeff Koons and Ken Price in his architectural ceramic forms.
The document discusses Yary Livan's work as an artist in residence at a school in Lowell, MA where he taught Cambodian ceramic techniques to students. Over multiple years, students created masks, fish, dragons and other sculptures and collaborated with Livan on a tile mural and operating a wood-fired kiln. The program helped share Cambodian culture and built partnerships between the school and other organizations.
1) The document discusses the responsibilities that come with creative freedom, including letting go of preconceived notions of who can be creative and what creativity looks like.
2) It emphasizes adopting a growth mindset and establishing a supportive classroom community to help students feel comfortable taking risks.
3) The document also addresses how to implement formative assessment strategies and competency-based evaluations in art classes in line with national standards, while ensuring teacher evaluations are fair to the unique nature of art instruction.
Kelly O'Briant is a web developer based in San Francisco. Her website kellyobriant.com serves as her online portfolio, showcasing her skills and experience building responsive websites using modern technologies like HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. Visitors can learn about Kelly's background and view examples of her work on both personal and client projects.
Panel: A Hand in Industry: 40 years of the Arts/ Industry Program at the John Michael Kohler Arts Center
Panelists will share insights drawn from their areas of research from experiments with materials specific to the Arts/Industry residency program to observations about new intersections between industry, design, and handwork. The panel includes a curator, an art historian, and two artists who created significant work in the program.
Alison Ferris
Ann Agee
Ezra Shales
Tom Spleth
The document appears to be an artist statement from Joanna Powell discussing her work. It includes the title "Beauty is a Struggle" and images of Powell's artwork from 2014 including portraits and details from pieces titled "Have Your Best Face Forward", "Sugarbaby, Take Him These Ants Are Gonna Sting Me Sure as the World", "First Impressions Are the Worst", and "A Simple Complicated Truth". The document also includes contact information for Powell and a request to follow her on Instagram.
This document thanks several individuals - Ashley Lugo, Maribel Lugo, Gilberto Lugo, Shannon Goff, Liz Quackenbush, Chris Staley, Paul Donnelly, George Timock, Cary Esser, and Jay Spalding - for their contributions to an unspecified effort or event.
Earlham College provided the artist's undergraduate education from 1996-2000. Further studies included earning an MFA at the University of Iowa from 2007-2010 and attending The Archie Bray Foundation in Helena, Montana from 2011-2012. The artist creates assemblages out of found materials like ceramic, luster, rubber and wood that seek purpose and beauty within natural conditions of disorder. Examples include Assemblage 32 from 2011 and Assemblages 61 & 52 from 2014 and 2013.
David Robinson received an MFA from the University of Nebraska Lincoln in 2004 and a BFA from the University of Massachusetts-Dartmouth in 1999. He creates large-scale ceramic sculptures and installations that often incorporate mixed media. His works reference his experiences living and creating art in places like Rhode Island, Wyoming, Texas, and on Martha's Vineyard. He is influenced by artists like Jeff Koons and Ken Price in his architectural ceramic forms.
The document discusses Yary Livan's work as an artist in residence at a school in Lowell, MA where he taught Cambodian ceramic techniques to students. Over multiple years, students created masks, fish, dragons and other sculptures and collaborated with Livan on a tile mural and operating a wood-fired kiln. The program helped share Cambodian culture and built partnerships between the school and other organizations.
1) The document discusses the responsibilities that come with creative freedom, including letting go of preconceived notions of who can be creative and what creativity looks like.
2) It emphasizes adopting a growth mindset and establishing a supportive classroom community to help students feel comfortable taking risks.
3) The document also addresses how to implement formative assessment strategies and competency-based evaluations in art classes in line with national standards, while ensuring teacher evaluations are fair to the unique nature of art instruction.
This document outlines a high school ceramics curriculum where students created a large ceramic mural for their school. It describes how the students designed the mural to represent community and equality, depicting elements like an oak tree, hands, and a night sky. The document then details each step of constructing the mural, from sketching designs to glazing and installing the finished piece. It explains how creating the mural empowered students and allowed them to take pride in leaving their mark on the school.
This document provides an overview of the Nceca 2015 conference session titled "K-12 Clay Curriculum Ideas & Techniques" presented by Diana Faris. The summary highlights several lesson plans and projects discussed including modeling dinosaur bones, creating celestial tiles, exploring culture through food sculptures, and portrait making. Advanced techniques like image transfer and combining perspectives through slab building were also covered. Faris shared examples of student work from various schools and provided resources for printable lesson plans and a Facebook group for clay educators.
The document discusses the history and importance of chocolate in human civilization. It notes that chocolate originated in Mesoamerica over 3000 years ago and was prized by the Aztecs and Mayans for its taste. Cocoa beans were used as currency and their cultivation was tightly regulated. The Spanish brought cocoa beans back to Europe in the 16th century, starting chocolate's global spread and popularity as both a drink and candy.
The document discusses the history and development of artificial intelligence over several decades. Early research focused on symbolic approaches using rules and logic but progress was slow. More recently, machine learning techniques such as deep learning have seen increasing success by learning from large amounts of data without being explicitly programmed. These new approaches have achieved human-level performance on some tasks but full human-level AI remains an ongoing challenge.
This document contains the name "Linda Christianson" and the country "USA" with no other context or information provided. It is an extremely short document that only lists a name and country designation in a sparse format.
Gerry Williams was a studio potter born in 1928 who passed away in 2014. He was part of a family of studio potters who worked in the craft. The document provides a brief obituary for Gerry Williams and indicates he was part of a family tradition of studio pottery work.
This document summarizes the key considerations for making chawan, or Japanese teabowls used in the tea ceremony. It discusses 7 main technical considerations: size, weight, balance, interior surface quality, rim quality, foot gripability, and the "tea pool" depression. It also covers aesthetic concerns like clay body, the front focal side, and landscapes within the form. Additional context is provided on semantics, traditions of chawan making, and the business aspects of selling chawan. The overall document aims to concisely explain what defines a high quality chawan according to tea ceremony standards.
1. The document summarizes common hand ailments that ceramicists may experience such as tendonitis, neuropathy, and arthritis which can result from repetitive motions.
2. Specific conditions discussed include carpal tunnel syndrome, trigger finger, and arthritis at the base of the thumb.
3. The presentation emphasizes prevention through stretches and breaks, and explores treatment options ranging from conservative measures to surgery.
Clay artifacts have the power to arouse wonder and to tell powerful cultural stories—and America’s museums have fundamental responsibility to help make this happen. This much needed activation begins with a dedication to thinking anew about collections as a way to make them more relevant, not only within the walls of the institution but also within the community and, in this digital age, for the world at large. Time-worn approaches to historical interpretation need to give way to more inclusive approaches through the incorporation of new voices, new narratives, and newer ways of thinking and seeing. This talk explores a wide array of museum-based and education projects initiated by the Chipstone Foundation in its search for more powerful ways to tell vital clay narratives.
The document discusses the importance of rewriting history to remain relevant over time. It also contains quotes about standing up for change through continuous struggle and not allowing others to take advantage by keeping your back straight. The document provides remnants and remains of the past along with references to rewriting and remixing history on a continuous basis.
This document provides an overview of the history and techniques of pictorial spaces in ceramics from ancient times to present day. It discusses framing devices, compositional structures, depictions of figures and narratives, as well as cultural influences from Western and Eastern traditions. Contemporary artists are highlighted who push technical and conceptual boundaries to create works that can only be achieved through the ceramic medium.
This document contains summaries of four past masters from 2015: Lidya Buzio, Don Reitz, Norm Schulman, and Gerry Williams. It provides basic biographical information for each person such as dates of birth and death, locations, and contributions to their field. Presenters are also listed for each past master.
The ubiquity of social media is undeniable
in today’s world. This panel will address the
myriad of ways social media can be utilized
in ceramic education, studio practice and by
curators to further the conversation beyond the
physical world.
The Lawrence Arts Center and the University of Kansas are partnering to build communities and expand opportunities. Kyla Strid, Marshall Maude, and Ben Ahlvers are involved in this partnership between the two organizations. The partnership aims to connect the university and local community through arts programming and events.
In recent years, ceramics in New York have
been exhibited in highly respected galleries not
associated with ceramics. This highly promising
integration into the Fine Arts could bode well
for the future of the medium. An end to the
stigma of the “craft medium” and segregation
could finally be at hand.
This global history of earthenware is based on
the travel accounts of explorers in West and
Central Africa, Mesoamerica, and the Iberian
Peninsula. The central figures are the artisans
who made, merchants who hawked, and the
cooks who served meals made in clay pots. Clay
pots had been essential items in the kitchen and
on the table with cooks using earthen vessels to
make one-pot meals such as puddings, stews,
and soups. By looking at the recipes made in
these clay cooking pots, we can uncover the
historical context in which people made both
the earthen vessel as well as the food in them.
This document provides an agenda for the 49th Annual Conference of the National Council on Education for the Ceramic Arts (NCECA). It lists moments of silence to honor ceramic artists who recently passed away. It introduces the conference president and various directors who will be speaking. It announces presentations on the conference locations of Kansas City and Providence. It highlights the Randall Session fine arts performances that are annually included in the conference programming. It provides details on Theodore 'Ted' Randall for whom the session is named and his role in creating NCECA. It also lists upcoming Multicultural Fellows and announces a 10-15 minute break with a trailer playing for the performance group ETHEL.
Awards for: Emerging Artists, Regina Brown Undergraduate Fellowships, NCECA Graduate Fellowships, National Student Juried Exhibition Award Recipients, 2014 NCECA International Residency Partnership Program Recipients, Cups of Merit, Board Appointment
Demonstrating Artist: Ching-Yuan Chang
Using color slip as the vehicle to express personal interpretation on the Taiwanese cultural phenomenon. Surface treatment of my works is not just about color, texture and design, it is about why I choose this techinique and how the process also plays part of the concept.
Demonstrating Artist: Ayumi Horie
Known for innovating a wheel technique involving no water, Ayumi will demonstrate dry throwing as a way to make bowls, plates, and match strikers. By using no water, a different texture, sensibility, and speed of making may develop that lays the groundwork for drawings to play off of. Ayumi will demonstrate sgraffito by drawing animal images on pots. Discussion will cover the role of social media, particularly Instagram, in the marketing of pots and how photographs can shift people's understanding of ceramics.
This document outlines a high school ceramics curriculum where students created a large ceramic mural for their school. It describes how the students designed the mural to represent community and equality, depicting elements like an oak tree, hands, and a night sky. The document then details each step of constructing the mural, from sketching designs to glazing and installing the finished piece. It explains how creating the mural empowered students and allowed them to take pride in leaving their mark on the school.
This document provides an overview of the Nceca 2015 conference session titled "K-12 Clay Curriculum Ideas & Techniques" presented by Diana Faris. The summary highlights several lesson plans and projects discussed including modeling dinosaur bones, creating celestial tiles, exploring culture through food sculptures, and portrait making. Advanced techniques like image transfer and combining perspectives through slab building were also covered. Faris shared examples of student work from various schools and provided resources for printable lesson plans and a Facebook group for clay educators.
The document discusses the history and importance of chocolate in human civilization. It notes that chocolate originated in Mesoamerica over 3000 years ago and was prized by the Aztecs and Mayans for its taste. Cocoa beans were used as currency and their cultivation was tightly regulated. The Spanish brought cocoa beans back to Europe in the 16th century, starting chocolate's global spread and popularity as both a drink and candy.
The document discusses the history and development of artificial intelligence over several decades. Early research focused on symbolic approaches using rules and logic but progress was slow. More recently, machine learning techniques such as deep learning have seen increasing success by learning from large amounts of data without being explicitly programmed. These new approaches have achieved human-level performance on some tasks but full human-level AI remains an ongoing challenge.
This document contains the name "Linda Christianson" and the country "USA" with no other context or information provided. It is an extremely short document that only lists a name and country designation in a sparse format.
Gerry Williams was a studio potter born in 1928 who passed away in 2014. He was part of a family of studio potters who worked in the craft. The document provides a brief obituary for Gerry Williams and indicates he was part of a family tradition of studio pottery work.
This document summarizes the key considerations for making chawan, or Japanese teabowls used in the tea ceremony. It discusses 7 main technical considerations: size, weight, balance, interior surface quality, rim quality, foot gripability, and the "tea pool" depression. It also covers aesthetic concerns like clay body, the front focal side, and landscapes within the form. Additional context is provided on semantics, traditions of chawan making, and the business aspects of selling chawan. The overall document aims to concisely explain what defines a high quality chawan according to tea ceremony standards.
1. The document summarizes common hand ailments that ceramicists may experience such as tendonitis, neuropathy, and arthritis which can result from repetitive motions.
2. Specific conditions discussed include carpal tunnel syndrome, trigger finger, and arthritis at the base of the thumb.
3. The presentation emphasizes prevention through stretches and breaks, and explores treatment options ranging from conservative measures to surgery.
Clay artifacts have the power to arouse wonder and to tell powerful cultural stories—and America’s museums have fundamental responsibility to help make this happen. This much needed activation begins with a dedication to thinking anew about collections as a way to make them more relevant, not only within the walls of the institution but also within the community and, in this digital age, for the world at large. Time-worn approaches to historical interpretation need to give way to more inclusive approaches through the incorporation of new voices, new narratives, and newer ways of thinking and seeing. This talk explores a wide array of museum-based and education projects initiated by the Chipstone Foundation in its search for more powerful ways to tell vital clay narratives.
The document discusses the importance of rewriting history to remain relevant over time. It also contains quotes about standing up for change through continuous struggle and not allowing others to take advantage by keeping your back straight. The document provides remnants and remains of the past along with references to rewriting and remixing history on a continuous basis.
This document provides an overview of the history and techniques of pictorial spaces in ceramics from ancient times to present day. It discusses framing devices, compositional structures, depictions of figures and narratives, as well as cultural influences from Western and Eastern traditions. Contemporary artists are highlighted who push technical and conceptual boundaries to create works that can only be achieved through the ceramic medium.
This document contains summaries of four past masters from 2015: Lidya Buzio, Don Reitz, Norm Schulman, and Gerry Williams. It provides basic biographical information for each person such as dates of birth and death, locations, and contributions to their field. Presenters are also listed for each past master.
The ubiquity of social media is undeniable
in today’s world. This panel will address the
myriad of ways social media can be utilized
in ceramic education, studio practice and by
curators to further the conversation beyond the
physical world.
The Lawrence Arts Center and the University of Kansas are partnering to build communities and expand opportunities. Kyla Strid, Marshall Maude, and Ben Ahlvers are involved in this partnership between the two organizations. The partnership aims to connect the university and local community through arts programming and events.
In recent years, ceramics in New York have
been exhibited in highly respected galleries not
associated with ceramics. This highly promising
integration into the Fine Arts could bode well
for the future of the medium. An end to the
stigma of the “craft medium” and segregation
could finally be at hand.
This global history of earthenware is based on
the travel accounts of explorers in West and
Central Africa, Mesoamerica, and the Iberian
Peninsula. The central figures are the artisans
who made, merchants who hawked, and the
cooks who served meals made in clay pots. Clay
pots had been essential items in the kitchen and
on the table with cooks using earthen vessels to
make one-pot meals such as puddings, stews,
and soups. By looking at the recipes made in
these clay cooking pots, we can uncover the
historical context in which people made both
the earthen vessel as well as the food in them.
This document provides an agenda for the 49th Annual Conference of the National Council on Education for the Ceramic Arts (NCECA). It lists moments of silence to honor ceramic artists who recently passed away. It introduces the conference president and various directors who will be speaking. It announces presentations on the conference locations of Kansas City and Providence. It highlights the Randall Session fine arts performances that are annually included in the conference programming. It provides details on Theodore 'Ted' Randall for whom the session is named and his role in creating NCECA. It also lists upcoming Multicultural Fellows and announces a 10-15 minute break with a trailer playing for the performance group ETHEL.
Awards for: Emerging Artists, Regina Brown Undergraduate Fellowships, NCECA Graduate Fellowships, National Student Juried Exhibition Award Recipients, 2014 NCECA International Residency Partnership Program Recipients, Cups of Merit, Board Appointment
Demonstrating Artist: Ching-Yuan Chang
Using color slip as the vehicle to express personal interpretation on the Taiwanese cultural phenomenon. Surface treatment of my works is not just about color, texture and design, it is about why I choose this techinique and how the process also plays part of the concept.
Demonstrating Artist: Ayumi Horie
Known for innovating a wheel technique involving no water, Ayumi will demonstrate dry throwing as a way to make bowls, plates, and match strikers. By using no water, a different texture, sensibility, and speed of making may develop that lays the groundwork for drawings to play off of. Ayumi will demonstrate sgraffito by drawing animal images on pots. Discussion will cover the role of social media, particularly Instagram, in the marketing of pots and how photographs can shift people's understanding of ceramics.
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The cherry: beauty, softness, its heart-shaped plastic has inspired artists since Antiquity. Cherries and strawberries were considered the fruits of paradise and thus represented the souls of men.
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Heart Touching Romantic Love Shayari In English with ImagesShort Good Quotes
Explore our beautiful collection of Romantic Love Shayari in English to express your love. These heartfelt shayaris are perfect for sharing with your loved one. Get the best words to show your love and care.
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Boudoir photography, a genre that captures intimate and sensual images of individuals, has experienced significant transformation over the years, particularly in New York City (NYC). Known for its diversity and vibrant arts scene, NYC has been a hub for the evolution of various art forms, including boudoir photography. This article delves into the historical background, cultural significance, technological advancements, and the contemporary landscape of boudoir photography in NYC.
Hello and Thank you to NCECA for this opportunity, and to all that have worked so hard to make this conference come together. I would also like to thank all of my educators and class mates and peers for your support over the years…AND thank you to all of you for coming this morning.
I live and work in Helena Montana and make pottery from the clays that I find there. Over the last 7 years my work has grown out of this beautiful place.
I first came to Montana for a residency at the Archie Bray Foundation. Through the support of this great place I began the core of the research that has become the foundation of my work today.
I had used a local brick clay during my undergraduate work at Utah State, so when I got to the Bray and explored the factory ruins and the piles of beautiful brick, I became curious about where the clay came from. Soon I began to search for interesting clays in the area.
First, I just drove down dirt roads, looking for clay in road cuts, spitting on handfuls of dirt. It was slow going at first. I once dug 500 pounds of bentonite thinking it was just a nice plastic clay. I learned quickly from that kind of experience and I have found a lot of great clay since.
So far I have located and tested about 30 clays. Half of them are suitable to use in ceramics, and about 8 are easy and safe enough to get to on a regular basis so that I can consistently use them in my work.
During my time at the Bray I also met Tim Stepp, A geologist and engineer for the Montana Department of Environmental Quality, and part time potter. We have been working together for about 6 years now.
Through him I began to study geology. While I am only an amateur at best, I really enjoy it and has become an essential tool in reading the landscape in order to find and identify good ceramic materials. One example of this is the Montana Clay and Shale Reports. Published in the 1960’s,
This survey lists over 600 samples taken from all over the state. It includes a great deal of information on each clay such as shrinkage, firing range, color, mineralogy, and chemical analysis. I feel like I have a clay catalogue of the land itself, the trick is just finding a deposit in such a huge place with 50 year old directions.
The clays of Montana are quite varied. There are primary clays that are relatively young geologically speaking, while some sedimentary clays, like the ones used to make this set of nesting bowls, where laid down during the Precambrian, roughly 2.6 billion years ago. That is an unimaginable length of time, in fact some of these shales contain fossils of the earliest known forms of complex life.
I am inspired by the stories that geology tells of the clays I use, and this has moved my intention away from only making the material do what I want it to do, towards first getting to know it without preconceived ideas, and then respond to it in a way that brings out the intrinsic beauty of the material.
The clay used in this jar, found southwest of Helena, is great example. Its a rocky volcanic primary clay that if ball milled, is a nice porcelain, great for celadons, but when left course, It can turn out a lot like Shigaraki Clay, most beautiful when fired with pine.
Another favorite clay, photographed here in early summer to show off its brilliant color, is very high in iron and reminds me of Carbondale Red.
It has an extremely rich color response, but it is very short, has weak green strength, and always keeps me on edge during a firing. Too much of it and huge cracks will rip open a piece, just as the kiln is getting nice and hot.
The majority of the clays I use require preparation and how they are processed effects their working and firing characteristics a great deal. They all get treated according to their needs, but most are dried out, busted up into smaller pieces and then hammer milled.
The batches are weighed out and slaked for a day or two, and are then blunged for as long as I can stand to hold the drill.
This slurry is then passed through a corse screen to remove only the largest rocks and sticks.
The remaining slurry is then laid out in squares, and wrapped in sheets to keep them clean until it is stiff enough to form. All of this takes a great deal of time and effort but it does produce clays with a lot of individuality.
I enjoy it most of the time, however I do have a great deal of loss. We all know ceramics requires one to have a certain resilience to disappointment, but I find that if my body is worn out, my heart is a bit weaker. When I first started out with the large crucibles, I was loosing 9 out of 10, now I am loosing about 5 out of 10. Thats substantial improvement, but even so I’m usually not very much fun to be around for a few days after unloading the kiln.
Helena, Shown here in 1865, was one of the richest gold rush towns in the west, and its history has been a big influenced my on work. Many of the clay deposits that I use were formed by the same processes that concentrated the gold here. I became interested in the material culture of this time period, especially vessels used in early industry.
The gold pan was the first of these objects. I love how these tools of sifting gold from river sediment functioned. I imagined the miners starring down into them as they swirled them hoping to see gold flecks.
I reinterpreted it as a serving bowl. Each gold pan here is an example of different clays found around Helena and the distinct surfaces they produce in the wood kiln.
With the crucible I took this idea further. These humble ceramic vessels were used in a furnace to melt ore in order to distill precious metals. I was inspired to make some of my own from local clay when I saw that many of these antique crucibles have splashes of celadon like glazes on them, and I realized that these glazes were the melted rocks from near Helena.
Those surfaces, like the gold, were a natural product of the geology of the area, and like the miners, I was searching for something precious hidden in the earth and transforming it with heat. The crucible became for me an symbol of alchemy, and an expression of the way I think about ceramics.
In them I try to create strong and poised forms with surfaces that evoke a feeling that they may have been used for many smelting pours and bear the scars.
This strategy has been a really exciting to me in that it can be very challenging to create a contrast between the refined form and the rough surfaces and still make it cohesive.
Instead of making forms that might mimic or accentuate the patterns of flashing, I make forms that stand up to the violence of the wood kiln, almost ignoring what may happen in order to develop a relationship that has tension, or is evocative of something other than a classic wood fired surface.
During my graduate research at Montana State University I designed and built a wood kiln. My idea was to blend the more gentle heating characteristics an Anagama with the shorter firing time of a train kiln. I wanted a kiln that could heat large work without breaking it, provide a wide variety of atmosphere to accommodate the diversity of local clays that I use, and do this within a manageable firing time.
It was a huge challenge but I learned a great deal, and it works exactly as I had hoped it would. The kiln construction took a little over 2 years so by the time it was done I had little time to get to know it and fire it before I graduated.
During that time I was also experimenting with Rhino to design new forms. I was exploring how my sensibility of form would change when put into a virtual environment, and was curious about what might be communicated when a computer generated design was wood fired. While I was thinking about this high tech/low tech interface, I got the idea to load the kiln virtually.
This process allowed me to visualize the stacking of the kiln and passage of flame. The pieces could be scaled to fit perfectly into negative spaces and then color coded according to what clay body I wanted to use in that spot. Measurements where then taken and I made the work according to this blue print.
In the context of local clay and wood firing it may seem a bit out of place, but it shortened the tedious loading process, helped me fit more work in each kiln load, and get better results in fewer firings.
I enjoy wood firing, with all of it’s gritty romance, hard work, and tight knit community, but I do it primary for the surfaces I can produce with it.
Each kiln load holds months of work, and 5 cords worth of trees are burned, so I am careful to create the best chance possible for the desired results.
I fire at a lower temperature than many other wood firers, and build up large coal beds that burry most of the work on the floor. Im trying to deposit as much ash on the work as possible.
The combination of lower temperature and large amount of ash encourages very matt surfaces, instead of huge glossy drips.
Thick crusts of sintered ash, once sanded down, have an appearance of lichen, stone, and rust, evoking the passage of time and patina, not the exposure to extreme heat.
I am careful to place each clay in the region of the kiln where it can produce the most interesting effects. This way I can utilize all parts of the kiln, and achieve a diversity of surfaces.
For example, this clay sweats out a sticky black glass as it reaches temperature and this collects a lot of ash creating sintered crusts and splotches of color. I place pots made from this clay in hot coal bed regions and burry them in wood as I reach the end of the firing.
This clay on the other hand does not produce color well in the coal beds, and is so high in rock that it doesn’t take surface in cooler areas of the kiln. I place it in the hottest zones and it develops this cream colored crust.
A final example is this clay that is high in silica and tends to turn a flat gray when exposed to direct flame so I stack pots made from this clay tightly in the back of the kiln to protect them.
Wood firing local clays has been a really exciting and rewarding experience, but the physical effort, and the high loss rate make it finically difficult, and emotionally exhausting. I am realizing now that if I want to keep doing it, I have to find a more sustainable way. It’s a point of transition that feels a bit spooky, and exciting.
I am looking forward to when the snows leave the mountains and I can go dig some clay and find some peace and inspiration. There I am forced into a beginner’s state of mind, and I reconnect to the foundation of my work, the forming and heating of earth.
If you want to find more information on my process and exhibitions you can visit my website at: davidpetersceramics.com
and you can reach me at: [email_address]