Picture Post: Gosforth

This picture shows several different pieces, some of which I subsequently destroyed and some of which I kept and continued to finish. The vase in the background I made with Dick's assistance; the shape is very pleasing, and although it is a little bit small, it's well balanced. The vases I originally made to be the gifts for others, but as I kept looking at them, over the week, I became less and less fond of them, finally tossing them into my clay to recycle. They were all right, but unturned (untrimmed) they showed the skill I still had yet to learn. The two jar tops I did throw lids to finish - except I forgot or underestimated how much the jars had already shrunk, and my lids ended up too big. I had to slowly trim down the outsides in order to make the lids fit the jars well enough. Embarrassing... but it was ok because I learned about making jars and lids. Plus I ended up with three useful jars.


These candle-holders were originally goblets in my mind, but Barbara correctly pointed out that it would be easier to throw goblets than handbuild, so I did candle-holders. They were made by using a press mold, which was essentially the inside of a plastic food container lined with saran wrap. What was, for me, the most important and creative part of the process was deciding upon and making the bases for each individual piece. All of the candle-holders have a base that deals with the number three; most have three sections providing support for the central base. I wanted them to look like a set, despite the differences between each of them, so I used slips in a single color family (actually, hard to avoid since most of the slips they had were of a single part of the spectrum, from yellow to blue). If you look closely at the picture, you may be able to distinguish five different slip colors. Or maybe not. But they're all there - light green used twice, dark green three times; turquoise used thrice, light blue once, and dark blue thrice again. To fill out the rest, I simply left the clay as it was - hoping that the colors work well with it. I'm extremely nervous about these pieces; I inadvertently became fond of them as I was making the different bases for each holder, because after feeling creatively stale, suddenly I had ideas just flowing from my hands. I am desperate to see how they turn out, but as they're being fired with the rest of the earthenware stuff, there aren't even going to be pictures until late August. Aaaaagh.
I almost left this pitcher too late to make it into, well, a pitcher. Also, it's being strangely hard for me to spell pitcher today. Anyhoo... I just threw it as a vase-like pot (5lbs of clay, go me!) and then forgot to make it into a pitcher until it was almost leather hard. I remoistened the top and edges and let it sit and then slowly began pulling the spout. I actually borrowed one of Dick's creamers from the shop so that I could attempt to create a dripless spout as he does. I don't know how well it worked, but it does rather closely resemble one of his so we'll see. The handle I expected to have to fight in order to get a long enough handle, but although it was far from perfect I was able to pull a handle on my first try. Another point for the experience versus the time spent away. Of course I put it on slightly diagonal. Whatever.




And here are my finished jars. The two in the back are the ones I had to scrape repeatedly to make the edges fit into the tops of the jars. The front one I didn't even turn - I liked it as it was, and it fit the jar rather well from the start. I think that the one on the right looks a little like a bobby's cap - a police cap for those from the non-UK side of the pond. Like me. I'm not from the UK. Yet.



This was a piece I made out of my destroyed first 5lb piece. Dick was helping me throw it to be taller than the seven inches I couldn't get past, and his hand got caught on it at one point like does tend to just happen. So I cut the top off and threw this with the bottom. I love this shape but I forget about it - Bev had thrown one with Dick's assistance the day before, and I badly wanted to do one myself as well. It's far from perfectly spherical, especially after I took it off the wheel, but I'm ok with that... sometimes.