Clay Blog Review – September 2011

Apologies for the tardiness of this edition of the “Review” (especially to the people that sit at their computer the first day of every month anticipating a collection of the best blog posts from around the clay covered internet). I was out of town for the weekend. There are a few formatting changes* but still the same great content.  This is a long post so click the title to read it all if you’re on the front page.  As always, thanks for stopping by and leave a comment if you have any suggestions or want to add something.

Technical, Techniqes, Tips

• Ron Philbeck shares the tools he uses for carving clay and a video to reduce dust while decorating (above).
• Meagan Chaney shares the secret “behind” her tile plaques.
• Bfree Clay has a tenmoku recipe and some nice images of the glaze and description of a recent firing.
• Brandon Phillips describes how he processes local materials (red clay, wood ash) to use for pottery.
• John Britt shows how a mistake turned into a new glaze.  And shares the recipes.  He also has a recipe for St. John’s Repair Cement and Steve Slatin’s GNU Blue ^6 and a Blue Celadon ^10.  And he also makes movies: Extruding Test Tiles.
• Gary Jackson: (stamped) ovals in three easy steps.  At least he makes it SEEM easy…
• Glynnis Lessing gives a lesson on oval casserole dishes (with pictures!)
• Liberty Stoneware explains the process of salt glazing and shows off a new toy.
• Brandon Phillips explains his treadle wheel piece by piece.
• Karatsu Pots has some not-quite-blueprints of a Korean style kickwheel.
• Linda Starr talks about warping during firing and swirl marks in her clay.
• Charles uses facebook to give a pictorial demo of acorn plates.
• Danny Knox shares throwing and decorating techniques from a recent workshop.
• Dan Finnegan has a few pictures of his slip setup and technique.
• AlexMMR shows one way to deal with runny glazes.
• Michael Mahan describes how he fires his local clay.

Regarding Recent Work

•  Patricia Griffin shows bowls from her woodcut series.
• Amy Huacani has some works in progress – etching and glazing.
• Ann Tubbs adds ceramic tiles to a coffee table.
• Deb Thuman shares some recent slab work: boxes and canisters, candlestick holders and dish.
• Phil Rogers has a series of posts with recent work.  The earliest being an Ash Glazed Yunomi.
• Rob of Simple Circle Studios decorates with slip.
• Paul Jessop shares some finished pots.
• Scott Cooper shares some work in progress and a theory on cracks his cracking problem.
• Gary Jackson has more shots of bowls before and after stamping, decorates ornaments, loads a bisque kiln and a soda kiln, and then unloads the kiln.
• Hollis Engley shares recent work and why some of his pots could have exploded.  And results from a shino-heavy firing.
• Luke Langholz has photos of pots in progress and finished pots and describes some glaze results.
• Linda Starr has finished some once fired pieces without glaze and uses a hump mold to make a sunburst platter.
• Ben Carter works out the kinks in tureen forms.
• Karatsu Pots uses saggars in a gas kiln.
• Ann makes bird baths, bells, bowls and more.
• Doug Fitch is has been busy throwing, slipping, and preparing to raw glaze.
• Liberty Stoneware has lots of pots in progress and shows off a recent firing.
• Brandon Phillips has some good things going in the studio and prepares pots for etsy.
• Ron Philbeck has finished pots in video format.
• Hannah McAndrew has many finished slipped pieces.
• Keith of MudStuffing Sketchbook has been busy at the wheel and has been working with decals.
• Patricia Bridges unloads the kiln.
• Margaret Brampton makes salt pigs and decorates them with drawings.
• Sea Bear shows off a bunch of mugs.

Thought Provoking

•  Clementina van der walt asks a tough question while comparing prices of handmade items and tableware manufactured in China:

Or is making tableware by hand becoming a completely anachronistic activity which can only be practised by those who have an alternative outside income?

Say it isn’t so!

• Carter Gillies shares some interesting thoughts about pots which leads to a lengthy discussion between clay bloggers.
• In another post Carter considers the idea that if an object is useful it can’t be ‘art’.

Where else but in art can a thing be more valuable if it doesn’t work? Where else in life is the pure contemplation of an object more revealing than also getting a hands on viscerally interactive exposure to it? How absolutely absurd this seems.

• After reading the book “Start With Why” Lisa applies her notes from book club to write why she is a potter:

To connect people to something real.  This world is full of fake, artificial, reproduced, and made in China.  Pottery gives people the opportunity to bring items into their home specially created through passion, love and artistic talent.  A handmade pot’s reason for being the world is to be treasured.  To be beautiful.

• Scott Cooper gives us a glimpse behind the curtain of tw@se and reminds us pot makers what’s actually important:

Having ideas is important, but making pots is not about the idea. It’s about making. It’s about the doing. The lie of putting concept before process, in my experience, is that you just never know if an idea is actually good until you put it to work. The best ones come through the work; they are revealed by the doing, by the discipline, by the execution.

• Tracey Broome is stubborn and shares her thoughts on facebook vs. blogs:

That brings me to Facebook. Most of you know my feelings on this subject. Not a fan. After reading Kyle’s post, I thought I would give it another go, so I went to several people’s pages and tried to read them. BORING……….. visually boring, the content is short blurbs, no serious thought put into the postings and everyone likes everything. It’s pretty much a commentary on our society right now. And it’s a sad one as far as I’m concerned. It’s also sad that people are choosing to facebook as opposed to blogging. Blogs can be so creative, so thought provoking, so visual and interesting. I have not found one facebook page yet that I could stay on for more than a minute before I was bored with it.

• Whitney Smith offers advice to artists just starting out: use social media.  (Check the comments for a good discussion).

And when I say “social media” I am referring to the social media juggernaut: the facebook, blogging, and the twitter.  And Flikr, which I guess is social media, but I look at it more as online image storage.

The Rest

•  Lori Buff gives a short review of “Functional Pottery” by Robin Hopper and suggests benefits of donating pottery or time to a non-profit organization.
• Paul Jessop has slip issues and later solves the mystery.
• Aaron Sober goes back to school and is happy to be back in the studio.
• Hannah McAndrew shares some images of “still movement“.
• Mea Rhee shares her choice for potting footwear and weighs the pros and cons of applying to the retail-only section of a show.
• Mary Starosta tells why she prefers flat lids.
• Lucy Fagella shares an interesting thought about photographing her work and who she is marketing to.
• John Bauman describes so eloquently the attraction of potters to pots.
• Dan Finnegan shares his feelings about adding a dustcatcher to a mug.
• Karatsu Pots comes up with some quick tables for upcoming exhibitions.  And version 2.

Making Money and Related Endeavors

• Lori Buff shares a tip to sell more art and she doesn’t like the time required to list items on etsy.
• Carole Epp and Kelly Kessler find a formula to calculate the price of work.
• Togeii shares an etsy experience and warns others of a troublesome buyer.

Get your popcorn ready!

• Doug Fitch decorates pots in The Movie
• Brandon Phillips shares a video about pottery Jim Malone.
• Ang Walford posts a teaser for the Slipware Movie.

Laugh Out Loud Nominations

• Dan Finnegan finds a humorous sign.
• Paul Jessop had “three nutters in the workshop all at the same time”.  I don’t know who these people are and I can’t decide if I want to find out or not!

*You’ll notice the bullets made it back for another month.  And now we have moving pictures! Special thanks to Ron for sharing all his great videos.  There would have been more embedded but we’re already late so I’ll go all out for next month.  I shuffled the order of the sections to put the most important(?)/useful links at the top.