2 Sales Coming Up

Next weekend, I've got 2 craft sales, actually. Please come by if you are interested.

Friday August 2
Liberty Station, Barracks 15, room 205
5-8:30
This sale shows work by people who were part of the UCSD Crafts Center and benefits our efforts to reopen it.

Sunday August 4
North Park Craft Mafia...
parking lot of the birch theater on 29th St., just south ofUniversity
10-5


Just really noticed the previous post. Messed up layout, sorry. Please ignore.

New Pots, New Sale

New pots again. It's always fun, though more when they come out well. The little ones were good, the bigger ones, ouch. Smaller quantities of glaze take different application techniques and skills; there's no end of things to learn. Hurray, along with the ouch.

I'll bring the best of these, and others to a sale on Sunday, August 4: The Summer Cement Craft Block, in the Birch Theater parking lot. That's 29st and North Park Way, San Diego, in North Park, just off 30th and University. They promise parking. It'll run 10-5. And no, I don't know what the cement is about.

I like this shape a lot. I think I really like the color.

An ok version of the shape. The glaze job would have been better...

I've used the green glaze before, far better on a white clay like this one.

I learned this shape, without leaf, in a class, have made variations on it for some time. Is the leaf overload? I like it, maybe smaller next time. An surprise, after years of enjoying colorful glazes; the white is wonderful for a complex pot. Eva Zeisel, my hero, invented (reinvented, surely) white pots in mid-20th century. It very much makes for a focus on form, which is what I most care about.

Something Really New vs Lots that Varies

I've tried something really new to me, and like it. This feels extremely different from what I usually do: repeating forms I know, and slowly developing improved (I hope) variations on them.

How do you get into something new? In this case I was asked to make it by someone who does not know what I do not know. Not intending to charge for it,  and with no deadline, I could easily, though with warnings, say yes.

I've never made tiles before, nor designed a tile layout. How do you learn? On the web, of course, where there are infinite "how to" pottery videos.

This panel goes into a kitchen, near the beach, with 3x3 blue tiles already in it, and tan and white cabinets and trim. OK. Here I've made more-or-less 3x3 tiles, in similar colors, thinking beach. Shells for impressing the tiles from the local beaches, and our and in-laws' trips over several decades. Sandy grout, beach pebbles. OK results for a first try.

And it opens my possibilities wider than I have been thinking. That's wonderful. Thanks, Chuck.

What Makes These So Beautiful?

I think these are gorgeous pots. They were made a few years ago by Irina Davidovich, from San Diego. What is so wonderful about them?

A couple of weeks ago, I was at the Contemporary Ceramics Gallery in London, where there are always fine pots. This year, I saw a lot of heavy, chunky forms and bright painted decoration. Not my taste; I am struck again by the range in taste among potters  --  applies too to any other field --  who make things considered good in quality. It's easier to identify technical quality, though sometimes people prefer effects that look less skilled than they can produce. OK, these two pots are clearly skilfully made; beyond that they are wonderful.

For me it is their delicacy and subtlety that stand out. They are about 3 inches high, made of translucent porcelain, feather light. They are mold made, which produces the side seams. For most people, molds are for reproducing a shape many times, quickly. These pots are slightly different from each other.

Both glazes used are almost the color of the clay, which shows unglazed around the outside edge of the bottom.

Inside is a clear gloss. Outside is something marvelous, with a pearly satin finish, and slight amount of color.

So the color range is very subtle. The forms are similar and simple. Within that narrow range, there is a great deal going on. Different amounts of shine and color. Different shapes. It would be possible, even usual, to sand the seams flat and smooth the top and bottom edges to make a finished-looking piece. Here those rough parts are left, contrasting with the smooth sides and elegant form. Without them, these would be much less interesting pots.

Would you use them for something beyond themselves? No, too fragile, and even too rough. They are art,  a delight to look at and handle.

New Pots, Always Fun!

And yes, all fired at home in cone 6 oxidation. And, I like the results. Progress!

This blue is going to stay as one of my favorite glazes. I love the way it runs, but clear glaze near the bottom  -- it really runs.

I tried to get a mixed blue/purple on these but made the blue too thick and the red too thin; the details matter.

Definitely another favorite glaze. It shows the iron spots in speckled clay wonderfully. Why the white/blue drippy effect? No idea.

Several months ago, at the Norton Simon Museum, we found these gigantic sycamore leaves, and I, of course, saw pots in them. About a foot across, and the real leaf, except for the veins. Those I drew, looking at a real leaf.

And a big fig leaf from our tree. I like the realistic leaves, though there is no reason pots need to be real leaf forms. I guess those are just very attractive shapes in themselves.

 Here's another leaf shape, used unrealistically. These are patterned on a nasturtium leaf from our yard. Little plates, for tea bags or as a spoon rest, or whatever you think of. Someone told me she needed a small plate for her retainer! And another way around the loss of the UCSD Crafts Center: I've missed the glaze sprayer, been unwilling to buy an air compressor just for this use. But there is a small mouth blown (blow hard!) sprayer for small amounts of sprayed glaze, ok just for effect over glazes applied some other way.

I love this field. There's no end of things to discover and learn.

Form and the Details that Matter

I've been developing a shape for jars or casseroles (same thing, choose your use). It's shape that attracts me to pots, more than color even, and far more than decoration.

I do not have much education in art or aesthetics, and so am not sure who knows this or can jump right to the best form. For me, it is often a surprise or discovery to find a good form. I think as I become a more skilled potter, I am improving both in hand and eye. 

This was the first pot in this shape. I like the handle and the rolled rim of the pot. Otherwise, kind of boring.

When it comes out well, the handle really swirls. It's light, simple and loose, and very practical --just what I like.

Ah, better when the sides slope in, on both pot and lid. The rim has a lift to it too. I'm not sure if that's as good as the rolled edge.

OK. This is it. The sloping sides, the lifted rim, the and a continuous line from pot sides up the sides of the lid. Still having trouble getting those lids to sit evenly on the pot.

This one worked well. And a safe glaze that should look good with food.

Not a word

for 2 1/2 months. I didn't even notice. Sorry, for anyone who is reading. It's been a time to focus on people dying.