Copying Ancient Greece

In the archeology museum in Heraklion, Crete, I saw this pitcher. I don't remember how old it is, but certainly from some time in ancient Greece. Could I make it, or a reasonable approximation?

It's a technical challenge, to try to reconstruct what someone did, just from a side view on a museum shelf. I can't call and ask the potter. It's also an effort to walk in someone's shoes, to understand what he (probably) did and considered normal. And it's a try to make something I like.

This pitcher has a nice shape, a spout like nothing I've ever seen before, and requires a tricky cutting and assembly job. Ancient Greek pottery is famous for its painting, but also is very complex in form, and so in making. This is a relatively simple piece for them.

My first try was really about making the parts and assembling them. Nah, looks more like those Italian espresso pots.

So I measured the picture to get the proportions right and tried again.

Not quite right. I found it hard to get enough width near the base, after that neat lift, and then collar in enough for the "waist".  The top is a bowl, but, again, the proportions are hard to produce. A lot is cut out for the shape of the top section, and for the spout.

I've always thought of and learned to make spouts that are a protruding  angle. This is a cut out arc.

 I had to make the pot to find out if it pours and keeps control. It does, very neatly, so long as you don't pour too fast; that lets the liquid flow around the spout as well. And will those points just break off easily?

The handle works better unglazed, like the Greek pot. These days we make wider, flatter handles usually, with a rectangular, rather than round cross-section:

 The round handle, with a glossy glaze, is really slippery, and the full pot is hard to hold.

A fun project. In some way, it's difficult  -- they were skilled potters. In some ways it works fine, and offers an alternative to what we usually do. In other aspects, I prefer our way. Well, of course.

Wild Stuff

Look at this!

It's work by Masaomi Yasunaga, a Japanese ceramic artist. He trained in and joined an approach to ceramics which is all about sculpture, in opposition to functional pottery.

 There's an exhibit, only this week, at Nonaka-Hill  in Los Angeles. Pictures are as close as I'll get to  it, but it's fascinating. The individual pieces don't grab me quite so much, as it is not at all my usual taste.

 But the combination, in this exhibit! Pieces on gravel, and the whole makes me think of objects retrieved from ancient shipwrecks.

That's odd, given the intent to make anti-traditional pots. His contemporary work is made of glaze; that's the material, not the surface covering. The only clay involved is that in the glaze. Because it melts in the kiln, the glaze is shaped in sand or earth forms, which go into the kiln, and the pots uncovered, like an archeological dig, after firing. So very new, and referring to very old things.

He also makes dishes, sold at art prices. I like them, with far less of a jolt to my ideas and feelings.

This is wonderful -- the pots, the ideas, the exhibit design, the shake-up for me.