It is amazing how seeing and handling the ceramics at the Freer Gallery is impacting my ideas and approach to my work.  My desire to be more careful and intentional has deepened. I find my mind wandering back to the forms and decorative elements I was attracted to that day. For instance, the celadon glazed pieces were breathtaking.  I have a new appreciation for this particular glaze, which is not so easy to apply evenly and deeply. I loved the carving, decorative handles and oriental motifs I saw.  I will take days to really let the whole experience soak in.

On other fronts...it is a special day in my studio.  I am firing the little kiln I brought last year for the first time, even as I am typing!  Cone 010 bisque, a light load, just for the test.  So far so good.  I will let you all know as time progresses our ups and downs as the kiln and I figure each other out. ......I want to name it, it that weird?

Gorgeous pottery from the stacks at the Freer Gallery of Art in Washington DC! It was a fabulous opportunity!

Unload Kiln..............Check!

Load #2, (the big boy)..............Check!      (Thanks Brooke!)
      tight load but still enough to fill another kiln!

Load #4..............Check!

Now ~

Artist Statement  (Again)
Artist Biography  (Also again)
Resume  (You guessed it - again!)

AND

GALLERY TALK!    OI!

Hopefully getting closer this time!

 Now, here is a beautiful sight!  Beautiful copper reds and 

carbon trapping in the cone 10 reduction firing.  

The weather was fabulous and the company great.

The kiln holds two stacks,

front and back. Most clearly seen here

is the front stack. The large, light colored

bowl in the back is the top of the back

stack. As we unloaded the different shelves,

we could identify hotter and cooler

spots in the kiln and which

glazes liked which.

This table holds the contents
of shelves 1-4, with the front stack
to our right along the back edge
of the table, and the back stack
on our left.  The pots are laid out
exactly hold the were during
firing. This way, we could carefully
examine each piece,  where it was
on the shelf and how it was
oriented on the shelf and what
the results were.

Here is the team. Everyone did a fabulous
job.  It really was a team effort.
Brett is not in the photo, and Shawn is
taking the picture. 
Thanks to Joyce and Phil for sharing your vast knowledge and experience with us!
Let's do it again!

ARTS 530  Kiln Technology and Firing Techniques

The
back
stack.

                                The front stack.
                                          
 
The
loaded
kiln.
Early
morning.                

                                Late at night. Almost done!

5:30 am-11:00pm!  Whew! 



Four fun filed days of firing a cone 10 (hi fire) reduction kiln (deficient in oxygen), lecture, and discussion, and tomorrow...testing and OPENING THE KILN!  Yesssss!  Of course, then we'll have more discussion to see how the kiln fired.  We'll map it, by noting how the carbon trapping on the shino glazes went, and if we got the beautiful copper reds from the reduction we worked on.  We'll look at all the test tiles and pyrometric cones to find the kiln's hot spots and cool spots, and which glazes did well where. We'll check the  star brick and bag walls to see if they did their job of moving the flame, heat and gases where we wanted them.  We'll analyze any problems, and record our findings, and document each shelf in the stack with photographs.  If should be an interesting and exciting day.  Here are a few photos from the loading and during the firing.  I'll add some of the results later.

What a great day!  I've heard it said that if you want to learn how to throw pots (on the wheel), make a hundred.  The first ten...meh.  Not so great.  Eleven through twenty, getting better. Twenty one though thirty, you want to glaze them. Thirty one through forty, you want to start giving them away.  The pots are really starting to look nice. I'm sure I must have reached a hundred bowls because I'm finally getting to where I can decide on a bowl to make, and purposely choose a rim, foot and body and make it.  In fact, finally I can duplicate that bowl, at least to six!  Woohoo!

Can I just say throwing pots is my idea of fun!  My porcelain class is demanding, but I love the challenge and the feel of porcelain. It is a sensitive material to work with but it is rich, it is luscious, it is creamy......mmmm.  I need to push the limits further though.  I'm making pots that are still quite heavy, more like stoneware. But I know I can push it further, stretch it, thin it out, blow it out, make it lighter, more elegant. 

I may never go back to stoneware (......just kidding).  But porcelain spoils you forever.

Our assignment was to make 6 medium bowls, each with a different rim.  Choose the rim we like best and make 6 more bowls with that rim.  Then, on each of those bowls, trim 6 different feet.  Then choose the foot you like best and put it on the first 6 bowls.  The challenge I see in it is to figure out how to make the different feet match the various rims on those first six bowls...whew!  Good times!

Ahhhhh!  Opening a recently fired kiln is like Christmas!  There aren't many experiences as exciting as pulling ceramics from a kiln and exploring each piece.  Even though we have created the piece, that last firing chemically and aesthetically changes every piece you pick up profoundly. Just like the adversities and challenges of life...they change us, and hopefully we come through them more beautiful than before.

This week we unloaded a soda firing at Hood College!  I learned so much during those long hours of firing....how wood, bark, oxygen, soda, timing, location, reduction, glazing, clay types, etc, all impact our work.  It was a great firing.

Nascent

Today, in writing my Artist's Bio for the blog, I was able to reflect upon what wonderful opportunities I have been privileged to experience in my life!  What a journey!

As I have fumbled through trying to set up this blog site, I have not been settled on what to call it.  So I bounced some words off a few of my children.  "What is a word that means...primal, coming from the basic elements of the world (earth, wind, fire, water), beginnings of time, creation, birth, from God, life giving, life taking....?"  We rolled these around for awhile. Then I hit the Thesaurus and found the word NASCENCE

nas·cent

/ˈnæsənt, ˈneɪsənt/ Show Spelled [nas-uhnt, ney-suhnt]   adjective

1. beginning to exist or develop: the nascent republic. 

2. Chemistry . (of an element) in the nascent state.

---

Origin:
1615–25;  < Latin nāscent-  (stem of nāscēns ), present participle of nāscī  to be born, arise, equivalent to nā ( tus ) born (variant of gnātus ) + -sc-  inchoative suffix + -ent- -ent

Synonyms for:  beginning, commencement, dawn, emergence, fountainhead, genesis, inception, onset, opening, origin, outset, rise, source spring, start

(From the Random House online Thesaurus)

 

I like the precise meaning in relation to life and ceramics. They are so interconnected!  Though clay we can learn so much about life.  But this is a subject for another day.

 

Because, however, it is an unusual word, I chose not to use it yet.  I want to let it settle in and see if it'll take hold in my mind.  Nascent Ceramics....hmmm. We'll see.  In the meantime I tried Fountainhead Ceramics.  It's not really working for me.  What do you think?  I have reverted to Janet Greer Ceramics for now, just so people can find me online. 

 

So the 'name calling' dilemma has not been finalized.  I am open to suggestion!  My career as a potter/ceramicist is beginning, growing, springing out of the basic elements of my life: experience, family, love, sorrow, ashes, beauty, faith. 

 

Hope you all have a wonderful day!

As I sit to write my first post ever, my mind is spinning at the assignments that I have from my classes this term at Hood College in Frederick, MD.......

What is my 'Visual Identity"?  Who am I really?  What is it about the world around me that speaks to my heart and mind and hands as I create?  What is important to me?  What am I passionate about?  How can I bring others to feel something when they experience my work?  Can I create connections, things that help people remember, and feel?

Wow!  I don't know all the answers to these profound and thought provoking questions, but my wheels are turning and I am sifting through memories, emotions and experiences that have brought me to this point in my life.  I am a 50 something mother of eight and grandmother (Baba, Abuelita and Grandma) of five glorious grandkids!  I'm thinking it's time to finish the undergraduate degree I started working on 35 years and 4 colleges ago.

Can I do this?  Will my hands hold up? Can I express the great joys and sorrows and wisdom, the beauty from ashes that my heart has carried for years?  What anchors me and feeds my soul?

This blog,  Fountainhead Ceramics, will be my sounding board and record the journey I now embark on.  It may just be the most memorable, intriguing and exciting one yet!  Come along with me as I skip my way along the path, it should be a great adventure!