T M I !

I'm currently teaching a six week evening class (at CIT formerly Central TAFE) on simple printing on clay techniques plus a few surface decoration mehods not commonly taught in an evening class e.g. Mishima, Sgraffito, sprigging and the like.  I write this knowing that some of my readers are also potter/teachers so I regard my blog as a discussion - feel free to chip in.  I usually teach this class in a one day workshop, mostly demonstrating, and it is pretty intense covering about six or more topics.  Breaking this down into small segments for two and a half hour classes has been a thoughtful process for me.  I've observed that students seem to want the instruction followed with time to try it out, with me within reach as necessary.  I factor in late arrivals, traffic and parking hassles and the fact that people need time to tune out their work day and into the class as something they've signed up for as a pleasure.  They prep some clay slabs as students gradually arrive, we settle into the mindset and the motivation is high. It is challenging to figure out how much depth into go into as each technique requires certain materials, certain tools and it is important to understand the process of what is happening with the materials in practice.  The class is a mixed lot, some are very up to speed on clay things and some aren't, but really want to be, so I have to modify my instruction accordingly.  Feedback indicates that I hit the right groove in general.  I set out to cover one technique and, having covered the basics I then cover the range of options with that technique.   I dread addling the class with Too Much Information or TMI and putting them off.  My aim is for them to go home feeling they've learnt and understood the process.  The reward is when the place falls silent and you realise the whole class is totally immersed in having a go.  While my students are in the handbuilding area Andrea Vinkovic is on the other side of the spacious open studio teaching her throwing class and her students also fall silent in their concentration.  All we hear is the hum of the wheels.  It is so satisfying.

I'm told that most galleries here won't accept work which uses the Japanese or Chinese printed tissue prints so popular in the last few years, due to the market being cornered by a handful of ceramists who excel in this method.  So we are learning to make our own tissue prints - less perfect than bought ones but unique to the maker.  

This week we covered Screen printing with Underglaze.  The image has to be put onto a screen creating a stencil on the mesh for the 'ink' to be squeegeed through onto some tissue or clay.   We covered the range of screen options, I favour Riso Screens (or Gocco) for their ease of availability from Jacksons Art Supplies here in WA.  You just provide a PDF on a thumbdrive, email your image or simply hand it in to a Jacksons branch to get it made.  We looked briefly at Diazo photo sensitive emulsion type options which would take a whole term of classes to teach well - and is sometimes taught at TAFE.  We mentioned that there are screen prep services who'll take your silkscreen, expose your artwork onto the screen resulting in a very durable screen - permanent until you need a new design put on it.  

image from NEHOC website

Then there's the superb StencilPro - a pink photosensitive pre treated mesh from the US you can expose in sunlight in a short time now available from Nehoc in Sydney, NSW.   We have lots of sunlight in Western Australia (surplus in fact, my dear snowed in Canadian friends).  

For 'ink' options - we ran with mixing powdered underglaze and low melting fritt with a suitable print medium.  For the medium I prefer, Derivan Print Gel, you can buy it in art shops or use honey or corn syrup or even condensed milk - as long as it can soak up and carry the pigment powder and screen it through the mesh.  A Curtin Uni print student contributed the condensed milk suggestion.  I am steering away from oil based media for now as the mess and cleanup might be off-putting.  I'll post on that another time.

Ratios of pigment to medium depend on the composition of the powdered underglaze - and some are 'thirstier' than others.  You want to create a densely pigmented syrupy 'ink'.

Ditto with the ratio of underglaze powder to fritt - some underglaze compositions melt more easily than others - so I unapologetically tell the class - there are no easy answers, you have to test test test!  I am awaiting some premixed black ceramic ink to test right now from Northcote Pottery Supplies in Melbourne but that will be another post.

As for colour options, there are some superb premixed liquid underglazes available from Walkers, Cesco, Northcote, Duncan and Amaco to name a few brands.  They come in a plethora of colours, but their viscosity is too low for use in screening.   In fact these products can be used by rendering them thicker/more viscous through evaporation and that elusive ingredient - patience, of which I have heaps.  Essentially most print on clay techniques are very similar to printing on paper or textiles, it is just the 'ink' that differs in composition as it has to survive being applied to clay - flat or otherwise, bonding to the surface and being fired.  The best prints are 'just' screened and applied while the ink is still wet to some moist leatherhard clay.  On Weds night we were only practicing on recently made slabs but the night was warm so they were stiffening up fast despite covering them with moist Chux/J-cloths prior to use.  Transferring a recently made print on tissue paper onto a complex curve means trimming the tissue around the print area carefully for ease of application.  In theory it is easy but in reality it takes an understanding of the process and some dexterity.  Fortunately ceramic artists seem to thrive on developing these things.  

I am preparing a short slideshow for my class next week, not something I'd usually do for an evening class but I want to inform and excite my students and 'set them on fire'.  

Let's see what all the other potters are doing at http://mudcolony.blogspot.com.au

PLEASE NOTE: All text in this blog posting is copyright of Elaine Bradley, Ceramic Artist, Western Australia unless quoting from another source.  All photographs in this blog posting are copyright of Elaine Bradley unless otherwise stated.  No responsibility can be taken for external links.  Please report any errors in crediting photographs, sources or facts to the author in order to allow her to rectify the matter.  Your response or feedback is welcome.

You learn something new every (Tuesday)

I am up to my third Maiolica lesson at La Maiolica in Fremantle with Cate Cosi and Amanda and it gives me two hours of the simple pleasure of trying something new and feeling free enough to think of it as 'play' and not as a challenge.  Click on the links above to get the history of Maiolica, you won't be sorry.  Like most new skills, it is not as easy as it looks.  Here is my bowl ...  Gigi threw it in Italian terracotta, Amanda and Cate are the decorating experts.  Mine is on the top left in each of these two photos, my husband has already 'bagsed' it for his brekky bowl because he likes cheerful things. 

For those who don't know, Maiolica (aka Majolica - I just stuck a 'j' in there but the Majorcan's did it first) is tin-glazed terracotta earthenware, usually with painted coloured brushwork.  Cate and her husband Gigi run the very successful “La Majolica” pottery in Fremantle, specialising in traditional Italian designs based on how it is done on the Amalfi coast, where Gigi was born. Cate has been decorating Majolica ware for many years with Amanda's assistance and Gigi does the throwing on a wheel that'd strike most as very odd.  See above where Amanda's left hand is on a plastic covered pot (ignore the plate in front of her), well that is where the wheel head is, offset by most people's standards and you'd think, a chiropractor's nightmare. I am told it is really comfortable and that you can rest against the wall while you throw.  

I've long, long been interested in Maiolica, the late, great Matthias Ostermann taught a workshop here in Perth in about 2004, he was amazing!  I have his book and also the great DVD by Linda Arbuckle on the subject.  I mention these in case you aren't as fortunate as I am with La Maiolica nearby.  

When you see something demonstrated by someone truly skilled the whole exercise seems to flow easily, the easy handling of the item, the flowing brushstrokes, the seemingly absentminded stirring and dipping into the colour all belie hundreds of hours of practice and lessons learnt.  This is why learning from such practitioners is a joy.  I've been wanting to do this for at least 20 years.  

Amanda and Cate decorate on adjustable banding wheels set on the floor. They explained about working with the right height, your comfort while you work and supporting your hands, types of brushes, care of brushes, and about mixing and applying the colour ...  how to flip over the ware without chipping off the powdery unfired glaze.  

Cate showing us how to practice 'banding' with water onto plain terracotta pots to get the feel of applying the colour to the glazed but unfired tin-glazed bowls.  The addition of 5-10% tin oxide to a clear earthenware glaze forms a lovely white opaque glaze onto which the colours, stains + fritt can be painted. Sounds easy, right?  La Maiolica import their materials for consistency and wow what colours can be achieved.  

We painted tiles in week one to illustrate the impact of one, two, then three brushstrokes over each other.  They colours are known by their Italian names as they, the clay and glaze are imported from Italy.  Here is mine below, before and after firing.

For week two we painted bowls based on this pattern but were free to use our own palettes and embellish 

Notice the wooden batt covered in bubblewrap (bubbles inside) to give a cushioned surface to protect the glazed work - which is still unfired remember...

 and here Cate is marking outlines for the painted bands with a solid graphite pencil, 
then banding with pigment and brush

Cate had the bands (stripes) painted on in the blink of an eye and the ends met - unlike mine :>D

then she marks out the areas for applying and building up the pattern.  

She places a wooden batt over the bowl, sandwiching it and flipping it over to decorate the interior.

Week three - a floral pattern, at this point we students are getting a bit cocky and 'gung-ho', ready to take on anything because it is a very enjoyable skill to learn.  Amanda told me how although she'd been to art school, her training at La Maiolica took place over years by gradually building up one skill after another.  Given what they produce at La Maiolica, I am not surprised at all.  The work there is full of colour, life and joy and beautifully executed.  

above and below, creating the flowers and baroque swirly fronds which divide the space but unify the design too

then the bowl is inverted to complete the banding on the rim and a central motif 

We got talking about this book, which I will order on The Book Depository asap, unless you, my dear readers, have a better source.  It sounds like my kind of reading and I believe there was a TV programme on Colour too which tied in so I might ask at our local Jumbo Video to see if they have the TV programme on DVD.  Happy Days to you all!

OK, that took a lot of uploading time, it was practically a magazine article.  Let's see what all the other potters are doing at http://mudcolony.blogspot.com.au

PLEASE NOTE:All text in this blog posting is copyright of Elaine Bradley, Ceramic Artist, Western Australia unless quoting from another source.  All photographs in this blog posting are copyright of Elaine Bradley unless otherwise stated.  No responsibility can be taken for external links.  Please report any errors in crediting photographs, sources or facts to the author in order to allow her to rectify the matter.  Your response or feedback is welcome.

Buckets

How do you label your buckets of clay and glaze?  I write on mine in permanent marker on the lid and on the side and tie a test ring with name and cone on it onto the handle.  Sometimes I even put a laminated recipe inside the bucket to be sure to be sure.  Tape dries up and falls off due to the heat and effects of UV.  Sometimes the marker fades or wipes off.

I was cleaning buckets yesterday and used this method of cleaning off the marker (or 'texta' to australians).  I wipe the writing off with a cloth and some methylated spirit or even insect repellant - note the Aeroguard bottle in pic.  I don't always have Metho around but always have the insect repellant.  It makes me wonder though, if it dissolves the Texta on contact - what might it be doing to our bodies when we spray it on?

I found a new source for buckets in a local restaurant - I may have to become a more frequent patron though .... mmm I'm not sure how economical this might be, one breakfast out might score me say eight buckets if I am lucky.  OK I am convinced, madness not to try, right?

Are you going to click on Mud Colony blog to see what all my clay pals are up to?

The ubiquitous FACEBOOK

I have a page on FACEBOOK.  I still haven't got my website up and going yet, I hope to get some new work made first  but meanwhile see you on FB occasionally perhaps    https://www.facebook.com/pages/Elaine-Bradley-Ceramic-Artist/185089588213875

Not 'Dutch courage' Dutch help!

Once Upon A Time .... (this will be a continuing story)

following a curious ad on a noticeboard in a little country supemarket this potter bought a very nice Heinz Welte German made kiln from an elderly dutch potter deep, deep in the Wheatbelt of Western Australia.  The lady's house, with its own airstrip, as ye do, was nestled almost invisibly in the countryside and so far from the local township we actually got lost for hours trying to find the main road again.  The kiln sits in my garage waiting to be relocated to a permanent spot and Henry uses it as a temporary shelf for various cans and tools.  Nobody else wanted her stuff - her entire studio full of ceramic materials and tools - nobody wanted to travel that far down so many twisty winding roads, to even have a peep.  Too hard!  It is near a place we visit often so we just happened to be nearby occasionally.  Health issues had turned her from potting to painting and she would have to return to Europe shortly because Australia didn't want her or her husband anymore because his job was not permanent and due to their age, although they'd lived here productively for years.  It is savage but true.  I bought a good few other items, but it was clear that the rest would go into the skip if nobody else turned up.  A month later, we hired a van from our neighbours, recently moved here from India, to pick up the kiln. Juliette (the lovely old lady) actually gave me almost all of her materials and bits because she felt they'd be properly used and appreciated - and that is the point of this post as you will see.  The Indian neighbours hadn't seen deep Aussie country like this before and were enthralled.  This is some of what I got ...

Now, here I am knee deep, literally, in the annual clear out of my little garden studio. Dead spiders are trapped and dehydrated on their own webs, rendering them unthreatening collateral damage of the hot summer.  Leathery dried, shrunken skinks and their abandoned eggs no longer upset me much, they get chucked on the garden beds as a kind of cathartic, karmic compost.  I haven't seen any of our blue tongue lizards yet this summer but a recent slithering movement under the lemon tree then under the avocado tree may have been a bluey.  I just hope it wasn't a rat or - Oh GAWD, a snake. That is what would most likely get me to reconsider Australia as my home.   We Dublin girls aren't all that tough you know.  

I am still unpacking all that Juliette gave me, figuring out what it is, and where it should go.  Bless her methodical and thorough ways, it was all packed carefully so it wouldn't budge or get damaged, the cardboard and polystyrene boxes are all labelled - in Dutch.  There's the rub as Shakespeare once wrote.  As you see from the photos, a tiny fraction of what I have, they are in Dutch and I cannot read, speak or even curse in Dutch.  I have one potter I can ask but if you can help, please do.  I have heaps more!  I have tried Google translate but it was not too helpful or relevant.

Juliette told me her Grandfather (or great grandfather) had been a very accomplished potter/artist, and I have a few things with his name on them so they must be very old.  I wouldn't be surprised if some of the things she passed on to me had been his once.  So you can see why it is a bit special and not just a 'good score'.