A new beginning

The Brattleboro Clayworks kiln was duly deconstructed Sunday with lots of help from members Billie, Annie, Lucinda, Jen, Maria, and Sue. The kiln was built in 1983 and although I suspect parts were rebuilt every now and again this will be the first total overhaul. Pictures are forthcoming. Tonight I took apart the very bottom two courses of brick and cleaned off the cinder blocks exposing the clean slate for the new oven. I'll be there after work each night for probably the next two weeks putting it back together, luckily we've got a big crew coming on Saturday to pitch in. Woohoo!

Orv Wright burns number 138

Last week was a busy one with prepping for the Clayworks' kiln rebuild (photos and more coming on that) and recovering from a cold while working. It was made even busier with a couple of night-time stoking shifts thrown in the mix as well. But busying oneself with the stoking of a friend's kiln is the best kind of busy I know. Orv Wright is a generous mentor and a bad-ass potter. I've been lucky enough to be a part of his firing crew for a couple years and it's always a pleasure. As an added bonus my pots from the previous post were in the kiln and ready for the heat.
On Thursday I started the wood stoking around eight pm and listened to the BBC for five or so hours while a distinct nip developed in the air. I had to shut the radio off around 11 when I realized I was grinding my teeth to McCain soundbytes.
Here's Orv taking over the stoking at 1am or around 1200 degrees for the night haul.
Here's Sorry about the poor quality of the photos, but their from my celli; although I kinda like the pink and purple in this snap looking into the main firebox. It looks a little ghostly, no?

There's the whole of the beast from the front. This was Orv's one hundred and thirty-eighth firing. Damn, that's a lotta mud.
Pictures of the unloaded pots will be forthcoming.

Some newish work

Way back in January, I made some pots up at Malcom Wright's during a house-sitting gig. I had almost totally forgotten about them until this summer when Orv mentioned that he had bisqued them. So here are the more interesting pre-firing ones. I've been playing around with stencils and the lightbulb and giraffe are some new ones.



My goal with these bowls is for them to stack in sets of four. We'll see how they turn out.

My Favorite Pot

This is my favorite pot. It's a two gallon salt-glazed jar made in Hartford, CT. I've liked salt-glazed wares for some time. As far as ceramic history goes, it wasn't that long ago (circa 1400 CE) that an unknown German potter from the Rhineland introduced salt into kiln probably on accident and low and behold it makes glaze on the pots in the kiln. This technique became hugely popular in production pottery since it eliminated the step of glazes the pots before loading and firing. It showed up in the American colonies in the early 1700s and became the dominant utilitarian houseware.
This pot came out of a house in North Chester, MA that was in my grandmother's family since it was built around 1805. It was among several jars and jugs in the house, but just stood out with it's tall stature and high belly.
The mark on the front says, "G. Benton & L. Stewart, Hartford." The other week during open studio tour I stopped by Mark Shapiro's spot with this pot in tow. Knowing Mark as a potter with a serious interest in New England historical pots I thought he might help me find a little bit about it. He consulted Lura Woodkins Watkins book and discovered that Benton and Stewart were retired sea captains who bought a pottery in Hartford and ran it for couple of years, around 1815 or so, and then sold it to the potter who was actually making the pots.
I love the rich brown color to it, so many early American salt-glazed pots are grey but perhaps the clay had more iron to it or perhaps it was in a reducing pocket of the kiln. There are a couple subtle flashing marks where it stood next pots in the fire. The handles are round and laid flat against the shoulder and neck with some cobalt and the attachment.
I've tried in the past to make pots like it, but haven't yet nailed the form. So far it remains as a challenge to shoot for, but for now I'm happy just to look at it.

Don Meno

Sometimes just when you think you know all the potters who live around you one sneaks under your radar. This summer I met a potter whose been 'round these parts for a whole mess of years and somehow our circles didn't converge until just now. He's built a sweet little Olsen fast fire wood kiln near his studio in Brattleboro. This past weekend he invited me to take part in the loading and firing of it and here's some pictures of it.


These two pieces came out of the kiln a couple days ago. The vase on the left was a refired pot from Penland, it's got that Mitchfield clay which really did a lot with the modest two pounds of salt. The bottle on the right is a bit of some stencil work I've been playing around with of late.

I O Way

Our trip to Iowa this past weekend for my cousin's wedding was pretty fantastic. It being my first time to that part of the Midwest I was charmed by the beautiful rolling cornfields, impressed by the humongous wind farms, scared to tears by the Jolly Green Giant. He's at least eighty feet tall and no joke. He could also use a couple more inches to his toga; there's not much for the imagination.
I took a short video of our epic ten hour drive from Chicago to Lake Okoboji, Iowa.

the ball mill

I've decided to build a ball mill. It's gonna be great. It's just a jar full of porcelain balls that rolls on it's side and takes a geologic process of erosion and speeds it way up. Potter's use them to grind up glaze components or homogenize raw glaze or clay or just make some loud noises for hours and hours. Simple. No problem. There are many designs, but I've taken it upon myself to try and make one that will accommodate different sized jars and thus need a variable speed adjuster of sorts. Here are some plans courtesy of an Onis Cogburn article out of an old Ceramics Monthly. I like the compact nature of this design since space in my studio is somewhat lacking.I've begun collecting parts and had meny conversations with people who know way more about electricity (the magical energy that makes lights work and my toast crispy) than I do. I even was given an old motor to use. Makes a nice grinding wheel motor but originally came from an old GE washing machine circa the 1940's. Hell yeah:
At the moment I'm trying to figure out if I can put a variable speed control switch on this motor. Cross your fingers y'all.