Diane Puckett

Hopper's book, Functional Pottery has that info and is in general a wonder resource.

Hopper's book, Functional Pottery has that info and is in general a wonder resource.

Floc and defloc also confuse me every time. Maybe I should draw a picture and hang it on the wall. The whole science part of pottery, especially chemistry, is such a challenge. After continuously reading about it for three years, I am starting to get the hang of it, but it will never come easily. I still have to consciously tell my brain not to check out as soon as it sees a chemical formula in a line of text.
 
I have discovered I love handbuilding even more than throwing. It fuels a creative energy that keeps me working long hours and pushes me to try new things. Even if a piece does not work out, the pleasure of creating it makes the process worthwhile.

Oh! O.k. Remember those horrid big ass long skirts made out of old jeans?You sewed a triangle of material up the middle? I didn't like those either. Or sewing those dingle berries along the vertical seams of your jeans? No !. I actually saw two guys wearing suspenders with jeans in the same room, this week. Jeans have belt loops, people.
I know I am going to pay for this one. Bring it on.
Only two more days of school, then I am FREE,FREE, ha! Ha!.

I love so much of the ceramics in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in NYC. I enjoy looking at the various forms which are the same ones we make today. The celadons of the Asian pottery are stunning.
 
What I find most moving is the pottery from the Egyptian tombs. It seems incredible to be that close to ancient pottery, some of it nearly 6000 years old. There is a perky little bowl on two human feet that look ready to walk away. I think about the potter who created it and wonder what her mood was at the time. There is a photo of it here http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/ht/?period=02&region=afe

I love so much of the ceramics in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in NYC. I enjoy looking at the various forms which are the same ones we make today. The celadons of the Asian pottery are stunning.
 
What I find most moving is the pottery from the Egyptian tombs. It seems incredible to be that close to ancient pottery, some of it nearly 6000 years old. There is a perky little bowl on two human feet that look ready to walk away. I think about the potter who created it and wonder what her mood was at the time. There is a photo of it here http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/ht/?period=02&region=afe

If you are willing to go to cone 6, check out the Coyote Glaze greens, particularly green shino. They have a couple others that look close. It is difficult to know unless you fire them on a particular clay. If you happen to have the equipment, spraying would eliminate brush strokes.
 
Another option would be using underglazes to get the color you want and then adding a clear satin glaze. Some clear glazes will change the color of green underglaze, so you would need to make sure to get one that does not.

Good idea! Years ago, Popular Mechanics showed a prototype design for a bathroom that could be shut up and run like a dishwasher. I would pay a lot of money for one of those. I wonder if a self-cleaning pottery studio would help or hinder my creativity.

I'm after a self flushing studio, flat pack form. walk out the door and the whole area is flushed out......pristine, ready for the next day.

never fear, Diane. it will warm up until we can't get around for the RAD studio tour for the heat.  Never fails!

Opening the kiln while it is still hot suddenly exposes the pots to uneven heat, ie one side of the pot is suddenly cooler than the other. Just that can cause dunting. The pots sticking to the shelves combines with the sudden temp change probably did it.
 
Harry Fraser's book, Ceramic Faults and their remedies has a lengthy section on dunting.

Thanks for posting this thread. I am going to my daughter's in a few days and need to remember to take a hammer with me.

Thanks for posting this thread. I am going to my daughter's in a few days and need to remember to take a hammer with me.

Thanks for posting this thread. I am going to my daughter's in a few days and need to remember to take a hammer with me.

Someone told me they use squeeze bottles made for hair dye, probably sold in beauty supply places. I think I recently saw caps made to go on opened containers of caulk, but I don't know where that was. If you create a good solution for this problem, you might make a fortune marketing to multiple industries.

Where did you get that cone 6 clay recipe? Manganese Dioxide is a scary material to use in clay if you play on handling the clay. Look up the MSDS sheet, I can't remember specifics, but it has skin irritant warnings as well as central nervous system effects through prolonged use. I understand that a lot of dark clay bodies will use materials like Manganese Dioxide to achieve a good black, but at what cost?

Thanks so much for the information and the kind words. The current project is a boat with a Native American woman and a bear. Her braid is the handle, the bear's mouth will be the spout and the flat bowl in her lap will be the teapot lid, with a channel undeneath it that leads into the body of the boat. The bear will be treated like a fetish with a raven and a few other things "tied" to it. I'm not sure about this bear in the design but I've gone this far, might as well keep going. I still have a ways to go but thought I'd share an image of it under construction.
Thanks again, Jayne

Well I had both my gas kilns cooling last night when we got a 6.8 earthquake.One is a little 12 cubic updraft the other is a walk in 35 cubic car kiln.The quake was over 40 seconds long. Within another 1/2 hour we had another 6-8 aftershocks -largest 4.6
Also during this time 24 hour stretch we had 3.1 inches of rain. I got my slicker on and peered in and saw pots stacked  on shelves instead of the back wall as I did 20 years ago.
Today I unloaded both kilns and all was well. Feel I dodged a bullet. All my stacked greenware in studio was fine as well.
Living In Nor -Cal near the Gorda plate is always exciting
Mark

This may help you in the future, it's not specifically about mason stains, but it may help: http://www.kazegamas.com/terra-sigilattas.htm

Because Asheville has been mentioned a couple times, here's a February 2013 story about the local arts scene (it's not specific to ceramics, bit it does hit on some of Paul's criteria):
 
Craiglist conversation is a tough take on Asheville's art scene
 
As alluded to in the initial post that sparked the above story, the Asheville Area Arts Council has gone through a tough few years. The current Executive Director seems to be doing some great work in turning it around, though - this profile is from last month:
 
Asheville Area Arts Council regains footing
 
My take: Asheville can be an expensive place to live, especially for young people and/or artists (who might be otherwise employed part or full-time). Tourism is big business, and lots of jobs are dependent on that - and not very high-paying. A lot of people work multiple service jobs. I'm not sure this is different from other cities in the US these days, but the heavy reliance on tourism can make it seem that way to a casual observer.
 
But - if you can afford to live in or near Asheville, it can be pretty great. Diane nails it on the generosity of potters and ceramic artists in Asheville and Western North Carolina. Handmade in America and the Center for Craft, Creativity & Design are two terrific Asheville-based craft organizations. And plus one on Clay Club - Clay Club rocks!

When I made an urn about the size of yours, it was just about the right size for someone who weighed maybe 100-110 pounds. I had filled the urn with water and then used that to determine cubic inches. This website offers measurement conversions http://www.convertworld.com .

Diane, Thank-you.  I'm not surprised that Asheville has already shown up twice as a Clay Artist city (Marcia also mentioned it).  I was really surprised that it did not make the Top 50 list on the article linked in the first post in this topic.  As it turns out, Asheville looks to fall short on the 20-34 age group demographic percentage and the cost of living index is high,comparatively. 
 
I worked at a camp just east of Black Mountain in my college days and fell in love with the Blue Ridge Mountains.

The only places I know of which use Darvan in large quantities are water treatment plants.  As with Xanthan Gum, you use very small quantities of these engineered products.
 
This is the tank where the Southern California Metropolitan Water District mixes Darvan with water pumped-in from the Colorado River.  Any clays or other particles in the water attach to the Darvan and are filtered out by sand beds.
 
Darvan Mixing Tank in Los Angeles

 
Darvan flocs being filtered-out with sand beds.

 
Some of our ceramic studio members checking out Colorado River water at the Parker Dam in Arizona from where it gets pumped to the Darvan Mixing Tank 275 miles away in Los Angeles.  A huge infrastructure and some fancy water chemistry supports our city in the desert.

 

Makes my brain light up.

It stuck like a virus