Neriage, also known as agateware, is a Japanese word that describes the process of blending two, three or four colors of clay in a random fashion. The color range can be very complex or completely random. The clay is not glazed and gives an organic, marble look when fired.
Curtis Benzle is a professional artist and teacher with more than 40 years experience in ceramics. His fine translucent porcelain work is included in many private and public collections. Curt presents the colored clay e-course at TeachinArt.
Links:
E-courses (online workshops) at TeachinArt Demonstrations, tips and techniques (Tips shared by teachers of TeachinArt) Preview e-courses (take a quick peek into our online workshops) Art Instructors (Meet our online art instructors) Colored clay e-course (See more of the online workshop with Curtis Benzle)
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Dementia is a brain disease that causes a long-term and often gradual memory loss and decrease in the ability to think. It affects a person's daily functioning and family members have to learn to cope with something that they do not understand. Marie EVB Gibbons is one of the online instructors at TeachinArt who teaches the online workshop, post-fired finishes. Her dad is going through the struggles of dementia, and as an artist, she tries to understand what it means to loose you memory and mind. Here is Marie in her own words.
When he doesn't know who I am, he questions if I am someone important to him. I choose to believe that this is proof of the heart's memory. That somehow, in his being, he knows me, but it is not in the traditional way of knowing. When I confirm that I am someone important, that I am his daughter, it brings him to tears, and to feelings of stupidity, and sadness. How can a father forget his child, his wife, his life. I try to comfort him with explanations that might make sense, to both he and I. I like the analogy of an air bubble. I tell him, "I am in an air bubble right now. You can't see the information that goes with me, but the bubble will pop eventually (and hopefully, for a little longer) and then you'll put it all together again, as it is visible, even if just for a moment.
Links:
Post-fired finishes e-course with Marie Gibbons E-courses (online workshops) at TeachinArt online school of art Preview e-courses at TeachinArt Demonstrations, tips and techniques Claire Beck lives and work in the beautiful Gold Coast Hinterland region of Queensland in Australia, about 10 kilometers from the coast as the crow flies. She completed two of the online workshops at TeachinArt, Alternative firing with Marcia Selsor in September 2016, and Porcelain Handbuilding with Antoinette Badenhorst in July 2015
My current raku kiln is called Black Betty for obvious reasons. I usually fire to around 1,050 C. The first firing into which I put the more fragile pieces usually takes around 40 mins but from the second firing onwards the time reduces until its down to around 20 mins. I reduce for about 20 mins then spray a fine water mist over the pieces to cool them. To maintain lustre I spray pieces with automotive clear satin finish. I’ve had pieces outside for a couple of years which still show lustre using this spray. I have a small electric kiln in which I fire greenware.
When we bought out block of land (about 2 acres) in 2008 we loved it so much that we used to say “when we live here we’ll truly be living in bliss” and after a while when we started building our friends would ask “how’s Bliss coming along” and so our house, Bliss, was named. My artistic endeavours really only started when I retired in 2010 with life drawing classes. From there I moved to printing where I won the Caldera Award in Murwillumbah NSW (New South Wales) for my piece Rainforest Cathedral.
I think my future probably lies in teaching. Funnily enough I used to teach computing as I came to the world of raku via decades working in the IT industry at various teaching colleges and Universities both as a teacher and as an IT Manager. Before that I worked in advertising and publishing and ran a gallery in a small tourist town in North Queensland. Strange what paths our lives lead us on. Links:
E-courses (online workshops) at TeachinArt online school of art Demonstrations, tips and techniques (Tips shared by teachers of TeachinArt) Preview e-courses (take a quick peek into our online workshops) Art Instructors (Meet our online art instructors) Alternative firing online course with Marcia Selsor (how to do obvara, raku, saggar firing) Porcelain handbuilding online class with Antoinette Badenhorst (Learn how to get translucent porcelain hand made items)
It is no more than 10 years ago that I first experienced working with clay. The joy of creating, the feeling of clay on my hands and the peace of mind all this brought were truly overwhelming. About 5 years ago I decided to enroll in the ceramics program at the Genk academy of visual arts and media. Till today, the ceramics classes have continued to equipped me with skills and knowledge relating to the materials and processes of the discipline. Very soon it became clear that porcelain would become the ideal medium for my work. Once a researcher, always a researcher, so I dedicate a lot of time to sample making and the testing of new techniques. For the making of my works, I rely on a mix of techniques: handbuilding, slip casting, dipping and the use of paper molds or other “carriers” to make individual elements which then are assembled into a – partly- intuitive final pattern.
I rarely add color or glazes to my work because I love the whiteness, pureness and translucency of porcelain. I believe that in some cases the combination of shape and a delicate play of texture, results in enough complexity. In case I do decide to add color, I always keep a certain degree of sobriety in mind not mixing too many color palettes or by using coloring agents that enable me to obtain a subtle natural look and feel. Mostly I rely on the use of either pigments or oxides for the coloring of porcelain clay bodies. When I want to add subtle color to bisque-fired pieces (or even green ware), I prefer the use of water-soluble metal salts. All works are fired at cone 6 under oxidizing conditions. As a newcomer in the arena of ceramic artists, I want to thank Antoinette and Koos Badenhorst for providing me this platform and for sharing so much valuable information through their e-courses and TeachinArt portal. Patricia Neysens completed the colored clay e-course with Curtis Benzle at TeachinArt. Links:
E-courses (online courses) at TeachinArt Preview e-courses Demonstrations, tips and techniques Our art instructors Colored clay e-course with Curt Benzle
One of TeachinArt online teachers, Antoinette Badenhorst presented a hands-on workshop at the Pottery Studio in Bryanston South Africa where she demonstrated the carving and altering process of porcelain.
She calls porcelain the "Diva of clay" and tells her students that they have to understand the character of the clay to really push it to it's limits.
Links:
Understanding porcelain e-course with Antoinette Badenhorst Porcelain handbuilding online workshop with Antoinette Badenhorst E-courses (online classes) at TeachinArt Demonstrations, tips and techniques Preview e-courses
The body has a high shrinkage and a tendency to warp in the firing and although I have tried several ways to stabilize the body in the firing with various setters, I now accept the gentle warping produced by the firing as a part of the process. Choosing to work with bone china for my work is I feel something that has worked really well for me and the work I produce with this body is quite different to any work I would have produced using the porcelain body I was using before. Links:
Links:
Understanding porcelain online class with Antoinette Badenhorst Porcelain handbuilding with Antoinette Badenhorst E-courses (online workshops) at TeachinArt Preview e-courses at the online art school Demonstrations, tips and techniques
If you are a potter, how many times have you found a lid stuck to a teapot or lidded box due to the glazing? How many times have you wiped off glaze that you should not have wiped off? How many times did you loose a lovely teapot because you had to break the lid loose from the teapot?
These pictures below are examples of the glazing challenges that potters experience when making anything with a lid on.
Links:
Faceted teapot set e-course with Connie Christensen Shino glazing e-course with Connie Christensen Glazing made easy e-course with Antoinette Badenhorst (guest artist Lynn Barnwell) E-courses (online classes) at TeachinArt Demonstrations, tips and techniques Our art instructors
Paper clay is many times used by ceramic artists to make the construction of sculptures easier. Antoinette Badenhorst demonstrates how she uses paper clay to create translucent porcelain vessels. Paper clay burns out in the pottery kiln and does not really affects the final outcome of the sculpture. It helps with the forming and sculpturing.
Links:
Understanding porcelain e-course with Antoinette Badenhorst Porcelain handbuilding e-course with Antoinette Badenhorst E-courses (online workshops) at TeachinArt Demonstrations, tips and techniques (Tips shared by teachers of TeachinArt) Preview e-courses (take a quick peek into our online workshops) Art Instructors (Meet our online art instructors)
I have exhibited my work at numerous galleries, universities, and institutions. I have received a number of awards and certificates, as well as being selected to have a solo show entitled, “No Ordinary Woman”. The theme of this show grew out of my childhood interest in the women in my community, especially those considered to have “special powers”- whether real or imagined. Although I’m inspired by people I have encountered, my figures embody “familiar souls” that viewers can recognize regardless of where or when they grew up. Each of my figures is an expression of a unique individual, whose story is told through adornment, symbolism, and gesture. Color, pattern, and texture intrigues me which promotes an open playground for ceramics and the ability to explore many of its possibilities. I have always been a doll maker, but the transition of making cloth dolls to ceramic figures has given me a broader enjoyment and satisfaction in the process of their creation. I love the idea of working with a medium that challenges me to transform a ball of clay into forms and figures that become characters based on my life and imagination. Working in clay has become my mental retreat, my vacation away from the world, my hands are happiest when in the process of construction. My intricate style echoes the influences of African, Native American and Latin American cultures. I uniquely design my work with an ensemble of metaphysical symbolism and color, which then captures an aura of mysticism, magic, and spirituality.
Links:
E-courses (online workshops) at TeachinArt Preview E-courses Our Art Instructors China painting with Paul Lewing Demonstrations, tips & techniques Catto Center at Toklat in the Rocky mountains
Links:
E-courses (online workshops) at TeachinArt Demonstrations (Tips shared by teachers of TeachinArt) Preview e-courses (take a quick peek into our online workshops) Art Instructors (Meet our online art instructors)
Antoinette Badenhorst explains with kitchen ingredients what happens in the pottery kiln with the ceramic glazes that potters use on their ceramic items. Colors that you normally see on the pot before it is fired is not necessarily the color that you will see when the pot is fired.
Links:
Demonstrations, tips & techniques for ceramic artists E-courses at TeachinArt Glazing made easy e-course with Antoinette Shino glazing with Connie Christensen Our Art Instructors
Mark Goudy was named the Emerging Artist in Ceramics Monthly magazine of May 2010. His work was selected for collections in
My formal education lies mostly in science and engineering: a Bachelor of Science in Biology from the University of Oregon, and a Master of Science in Electrical Engineering from California State University in San Jose. I did take various art classes along the way, but it wasn't until much later in life that I even thought about pursuing a career in ceramics. My interest in music and my hobby of building electronic music synthesizers propelled me into the study of electrical engineering in my late 20s. I ended up working for twenty years as a logic design engineer in the computer graphics industry (including Pixar, Silicon Graphics, nVidia.) After my mother passed away in 2004, my wife Liza had the idea for us to take a raku class at a local Bay Area adult school, an homage to my mother's creative spirit. Following a twenty-year career working as an engineer in the virtual world of computer chip design, I found the process of clay work to be a cathartic experience - resonating at some deep unconscious level. The physical nature of handbuilding unique pieces from this plastic medium was immediately satisfying. Soon I was applying my analytical and problem-solving skills to the multivariate issues that surfaced in the clay studio, and exercising my right brain to construct forms in a totally intuitive way. My approach to ceramics stems from the intersection of my love of the geometries of nature and abstract minimalist art. My mission as an artist is first to create a coherent visual language, and then learn to speak in that language. For me, certain forms evoke a sense of quiet stillness and mystery, and exist in a dimension apart from language. I don't fully understand it. My current process is to handbuild ceramic forms, joining sections of curved parabolic surfaces that I create using purpose-built plaster hump molds. After a series of scraping, paddling, and shaping transformations, the models are bisque fired and used to make multipart plaster molds. The final works are slipcast, using various clay bodies that I have created. I see slipcasting as a way to translate one clay body, which is optimized for building, into another clay body with different properties - of lightness or translucency for instance. Sometimes I burnish earthenware forms to impart a smooth surface with a subtle grain pattern. For other works, there is a lot of wet-sanding to refine and even out the surface. I use no glazes in my work. Instead I have developed techniques for adding color and pattern through the use of metal salts, following the lead of renowned Norwegian ceramic artist Arne Åse. These compounds are the water-soluble form of the same metals used to color traditional ceramic glazes. After painting on, they soak into the bisque-fired clay, interact with each other, and become a permanent part of the surface after firing. All my work so far is low-fired, at cone 01 or below. Many thanks to Antoinette Badenhorst and her e-course on Porcelain handbuilding to help me understand the unique qualities of this beautiful material.
Pinching clay is one of the underestimated techniques among potters. Many believe that pinching is just for beginners, but if you master pinching skills, then you can use this even when you are working on the potters wheel.
There are challenges with pinching and sometimes a pinch pot gets completely out of control. This video shows an easy way of how to do in-pinching to get the pinch pot back under your control. With pinching, you can develop "eyeballs on your fingers", as Antoinette always tells her students. Clay pinching skills will help you to judge the thickness of a wall or a bottom on a pot - helping you with trimming. Antoinette Badenhorst presents an online workshop where she teaches potters how to pinch a complete functional teapot with clay (Pinching teapots for Beginners).
When is the right time to use blunt tools and when should you use sharp trimming tools? How dry should the pot be before you can start with the trimming? When is the best time in the drying stage to start with the trimming process? Is there a right and wrong way for trimming on the wheel? Which is the best trimming tool? How to trim a foot rim? How to trim porcelain?
All of these are valid questions by potters and these problems are all addressed in the online workshops at TeachinArt, the online art school where potters can see close-up demonstrations of each process and can learn the best techniques in the comfort of their own place and own time.
Antoinette Badenhorst explains the bullshead wedging technique in her online workshop Understanding Porcelain.
Wedging clay is a hot topic to discuss among potters. Some believe that spiral wedging is the best way for preparing the clay, while others will not even think about moving away from the bull's head or ram's head wedging technique. Some ceramic artists even differ about the spelling of the wedging technique - is it bullshead, or maybe bull's head or even just bulls head - and the same argument is used for the ramshead method. Then we also have other techniques like slam wedging and there may be more, but we will discuss that later.
Some ceramic scholars learn that a chunk or block of clay is cut into two pieces with the shape of a wedge. The top one is lifted from the lower one, turned over and slammed onto the wedge that remained on the wedging table. This process is repeated until there are no more air pockets in the clay.
Kneading follows the wedging process to get the clay uniform in plasticity, texture and color. Some potters believe you have to count the number of wedgings or kneadings, and some who are long time in clay say they feel when the clay is ready.
Other links:
How to do spiral wedging (David Voorhees) How to center clay (Antoinette Badenhorst) Demonstrations, tips & techniques E-course (online workshops)
Nan RothwellNan Rothwell is a professional, functional potter from North Carolina who have 40+ years ceramics experience. She is the online instructor for the take your wheel throwing to the next level e-course at TeachinArt. She shares tips and techniques in her online class with potters and shows them how to move into advanced throwing with ease.
When you attach a handle to a mug, teapot, jug or any other clay wall, cracking of the handle is one of the big problems. There are several reasons why handles crack loose, but this tip from Nan Rothwell may help you prevent some of your cracking reasons in the future.
Other links:
Learn pottery online (E-courses) See our other demonstrations, tips & techniques Preview e-courses
Centering of clay on the wheel is one of the most crucial parts of wheel throwing. This is the time to get the clay particles in the right place and to build on to the wedged clay process. If the clay is not centered correctly, then the pulling-up of the walls becomes a nightmare.
There are some potters who do not know that you can set the wheel to spin clockwise or anti-clockwise. Right handed potters should let the wheel spin anti-clockwise and left-handed throwers should switch the direction of the wheel head to a clockwise motion. Throwing on the wheel is easier if you use technique instead of force. It is easier to get your arm locked on your upper leg and let you leg do the pushing and steadying instead of just your arms. This is a video clip from the Understanding Porcelain e-course by Antoinette Badenhorst.
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