July workshops at Alfred (NY) University

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Feeling the need to at least temporarily remedy my state of relative creative isolation, I’ll be attending two July pottery workshops at Alfred University in Western New York. Situated about an hour west of Ithaca, Alfred features arguably the country’s top academic clay program.

I’ll be combining a two-week workshop — led by Linda Sikora and Matthew Metz — with the last two weeks of a four-week workshop, led by John Gill and In-Chin Lee. Sikora and Gill are professors in the Alfred ceramics program. I’ve long been familiar with the work of Sikora and Metz; Gill and In-Chin Lee, not so much.

Hopefully, the month will provide experiences and benefits I wasn’t expecting. At a minimum, I’m looking for some serious creative recharging, and some bald critiques of my recent work. And, unlike all my previous workshop experiences — which were the traditional 3-day, weekend affairs — this extended program will provide me the opportunity to apply new things on the wheel in the more long-term presence of the sources of instruction and inspiration.

Beyond the clay, I’m looking forward to some pastoral biking in much less than 99-degree temperatures; a meal or two at Moosewood; a couple of minor league baseball games in Auburn, involving the Pirates’ New York-Penn League affiliate; and perhaps a day at the roots and zydeco-tinged Grassroots music festival.

 

 

 

 

“Hot” summer 2015 firing

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6_15_firing_1Rick Rowland and I unbricked a lovely kiln this morning, our second very nice firing this year. In addition to several of Rick’s vases of various shapes and sizes, the firing brought me, among other things, three Summerhaven jars: one the usual size (about 11″ high), but two of my first attempts at larger versions (one 16″ and another 14″), both produced by combining together two separately thrown cylinders.

My take also included my first dinnerware set in about two years. A commission from friends in Tennessee, it consists of four plates, four serving bowls, and four small tumblers. They’re all lined with woos blue, surrounded by tomato red.

Finally, the firing included about three dozen mugs, including a number of 16-ounce versions of what I call modified double barrel mugs, with a flared base and a fluted top. I’d been throwing these for about a year, but they were consistently bottom heavy. A new throwing technique, involving aggressively trimming a slightly damp, tall cylinder before shaping the finished form, helped me get the mugs down to an acceptable weight.

All the mugs, including about a dozen 12-ounce convex forms, were festooned with drippy slip and glazed with woos blue; shino; woos blue covering shino; or white salt.

This will be my last firing before heading to Alfred (New York) University for two, two-week clay workshops.