Qotw: What Part Of Your Production Do You Feel Is The Most Creative Outlet In The Overall From Start To Finish. From The First Design , To Making, Dec

[Pres]

This weeks question comes from Marcia Selsor, who asks:

 

What part of your production do you feel is the most creative outlet in the overall from start to finish. From the first design , to making, decorating ,trimming, bisque, more decorating, glaze, firing, presenting/selling/ marketing?

 

 

For me it is the wheel work, especially of late, as I have always believed I have a special connection to the rhythms of the wheel. In years past, wheel work and decoration was separate, each being a step that occurred with very little overlap. In the last few years the throwing has loosened up, and the decoration appears more before the throwing is completed. There is the beginning throwing for a cylinder or bowl form, but then there may be flourishes of a tool, impressions from all sorts of stamps and then more before shaping and more throwing. Often the textural result is reminiscent of stone, or crystals, or something almost but not quite organic. All of this has become very sub conscious to some degree, the planning before hand by choosing what tools, stamps or slips to use, then the general choice of the form, and then the fun begins with the throwing and all that comes within it is such joy, sometimes I almost feel drunk at trying to inflate the form as wide as possible before the textures rip into the inside. At this point, I patch and re-smooth the interior leaving even the patches to show. May not be for everyone, but this really seems to be the immediacy I desire out of the work at this time.

 

 

best,

Pres

 

 

[Denice]

The work I am doing right now I would say the decorating.  I am making general style hand coiled pots and then add the art, I research books and look for ancient Indian designs to put on the pot.  The design needs to fit  and move with the curves of the pot but still have balance, grace and refinement.     Denice

[glazenerd]

This one might be a tough one to explain. I do like the process of crystalline glaze, but am rather knee deep into developing clay. So how would I describe the experience of formulating? Except to say I feel the same joy as when a potter pulls a prized piece from the kiln. The creative part comes in calculating the end product before you begin mixing.

 

Nerd

[GiselleNo5]

I think the most creative part of my work is in experimenting and tweaking each design till I get it just the way I want it. Sure, making the form is creative; carving; glazing; it's all creative. But the time my wheels are really turning is when I develop a new design.

 

First I try Plan A, and say it is a 40/100 for how I wanted it to look. I figure out what is not fitting, and why; then I think of what I can try next to get closer. I cannot wait to get back in there and try something new. The following plans can actually be a step back; for example (before I started using my own work daily to test it) I was so worried that the bare clay would soak up oils and stains that I was glazing it in clear which really ruined the whole look and feel of the piece for me. That generation was Plan D and I would say I went from a 70/100 to a 20/100 with that load. Fortunately I discovered that my clay is really well vitrified and the pieces I've used daily, left in dishwater, set down in grease, you name it, are still beautiful and fresh and look new. 

 

Whether I'm taking one step forward or two steps back, this is the stage when I can't stop thinking about what I'm working on now and tomorrow, when I wake up groping for a pen to sketch out an idea before I lose it, when I am itching to go and make work. I was trying to figure out how to get clear sharp lines for my grass that I didn't have to glaze hairline by hairline; woke up bolt upright one morning remembering a technique of wax resist mishima with underglaze and knew that was it. I still use that technique on over 75% of what I make. 

[Mark C.]

glazing and firing

I'm not a mud potter-I'm a flame potter

[rakukuku]

Probably the carving step of my hand building. My little figures are hand formed as pretty much pinch pots, then carved and refined after they set up a little. Really like the carving part. 

[Joseph Fireborn]

I definitely like the throwing and altering the most for my creative outlet. I am constantly taking things way too far then scaling them back to a more reasonable level. I like glazing as well, but it isn't as enjoyable as throwing as I can't see my results instantly. 

[yappystudent]

That's funny some of our signature icons are taken from the step we feel the most stimulated by.

For me it's sculpting; watching the sketches I've made for a concept come to exist in 3D reality is like having some strange power. If the question had been 'most successful' step, I'd say the drawings themselves, as the clay object resulting doesn't always turn out, however I do drawings all the time for all sorts of ideas, the drawing step has lost it's challenge so to speak. Recently I've been doing some small pieces with no drawings at all, just free-carving into a lump of clay, what I've come up with is a lot of tribal-looking faces that have given me further ideas that I can't wait to try. 

[Kellykopp]

The throwing then altering part of my process.  Sketching ideas falls into the category as well, but most of my work is inspired as I go...spur of the moment, from the heart.

[Roberta12]

Tough question for me.  Each part of the process brings me great creative joy, but I hate breaking from throwing/building to move to glazing.  Once I am glazing, I don't want to stop that process.  And for the last couple of years, I have become a sketcher.  (not sketchy!)  and I like that process as well and don't want to stop.  Doesn't look like I answered the question and apparently my ADD is showing!!!!!!! 

 

Roberta

[High Bridge Pottery]

Only in the firing do you create ceramics   That's my favourite bit, making things hot. I feel like a volcano/the earth creating rocks.

[LeeU]

Not able to compartmentalize, from the dream state to the done state. For me, every minute, every aspect, is infused with the rush of making something satisfying. If it doesn't satisfy after it's out of the kiln & sat around for a bit, it meets Mr. Hammer. If it didn't satisfy before that, it doesn't make it to the kiln. Not sure whether the Self is expressing a creative outlet, or inhaling a creative inlet. Probably doesn't matter, as long as something more positive than negative is happening. The creativity is a gestalt of the clay and the maker, by which the whole must exist independent of its parts, and yet be a merging of all influences in, by, and of, the process. That said, I get the biggest charge when playing touchy-feeley with the physical item, and that in turn gooses the cycle (creative outlet/creative inlet) to begin again.

[Min]

 

The most creative part for me is working out the design. Once I’ve got that tweaked and made a dozen or so of the form it gets to the point of muscle memory kicking in and I don’t have to think about what I’m doing so intently. I enjoy throwing the most, even forms I’ve made a gazillion times and least enjoyable would be glazing (or cleaning up the mess afterwards).