A Piece from the Last Anagama Firing

The last anagama firing of the year was a sweet one. We were able to fire it for almost 40 hours with a good 6 hour soak. I had a few pieces in the middle of the chamber. I was pleased with the results. These works are quiet- as most of my work leans.  I'm becoming more interested in playing with the surrounding space through the use of shavings.  Creating an environment for the pieces to relate to, something I have always been interested in.  I am looking for a visual record of the various movements and the rests.  Spacial symmetry is more important than the formal symmetry of the piece itself. Sculpturally, objects do not exist in a vacuum.  Forms activate the space around them.  A form, its shape, the marks and the positioning all record parts of the process, parts of the whole, connecting the beginning to the end.  This is a fundamental interest in my non-functional work.

As mentioned in a previous post, these are thrown much like an amphora.  I like the connection to that seminal form.  I practiced nothing but amphorae one summer in the Cortland ceramics studio.  I knew if you could make an amphora you could make anything.  And the name- an amphora.  Beautiful.  The Greeks knew how to create a sense of respect for that beauty- they gave it a name.

I also remember being smitten that summer by the work of the Shigaraki potters in Japan.  Pots of sturdy, yet somehow beautiful forms (defined by lines anything but fair), with surfaces of a beautiful sheen, dark underneath, yet blushing with reds, oranges, and specks of milky blue feldspar breaking through, not to mention the wheat/green glaze appearing magically, sheeting the shoulders of large round works, a result of ash flying through kiln.  These pots were so laden with kiln effects (tactile and visual memories) that you had to consider the importance and meaning they had to the potters who expending so much energy to make them.   After all, isn't meaning of any sort wholly dependent on memories?  Reading (mostly looking at the pots) Louise Allison Cort's book, 'Shigaraki, Potters Valley' initiated a life long excitement in giving pots that extra layer of information and meaning for the viewer/holder to engage and question.  How much effort and care was taken to get this result?  How long was this piece in the fire bath to achieve this surface?  Why would someone want to do this?  What is it about color that does not hit you square, that changes with the light.  The Japanese had long ago answered these questions.  I had core agreements with them.  Why would I want to cover these subtle, yet eye engaging surfaces with a glaze?  Imagine a whisper, that is projected in the force of a shout- haaaaaahhh!!!!! That is what I found immediately appealing.

Back in school, the use of "wood bodies" such as you can find now was less an option, if for no other reason than wood was not yet a popular firing choice in this country.  We knew how to design, tweak really, a clay body for use in salt, but clay "for wood" firing was not given much thought, as I recall.  Maybe this was for the better.  The potters I knew and studied under had a different aesthetic approach to making pots.  It was less about "wood" or "salt" and more about the base response to material.  The concept of craftsmanship was at the core of ones work.  Henry Gernhardt was fond of dark bodies for most of his work with the exception of his raku pieces.  He would add iron oxide to his clay bodies.  The darker the clay the better.  His glazed work responded well to the iron drawn up from the body (no accident since his mastery of glaze formulation was legendary at Syracuse- that knowledge of glaze chemistry was the first of many things I came to admire about him).  His pieces were utterly dark, but uplifting at the same time.  This beautiful tension was a result of his full, sure forms and clear shaping (influenced from a sabbatical trip to Scandanavia, maybe, but also a manifestation of his German heritage, his uncompromising craftsmanship and mastery of form).  Another teacher, John Jessiman, was always talking about how his work would be altered by the body he was throwing.  His work in porcelain was different from the work he did in stoneware.   So John's work, like Henry's, was affected from the very start of the process by the material.  How their work was fired was a significant part of this equation, but not the sole focus.

The Japanese, who had centuries of wood firing to glean knowledge from, were very conscious of the look of the work coming out of the kilns, especially if they worked in one of the great pottery villages like Bizen or Shigaraki.  Tradition held an important hold on generation after generation of these potter's works.  But they too had a connection to the material from first touch.  The forms they made, the shapes they described, and the lines they made were a direct response to the clay they used.  Touch.  The kiln was a tool bringing out that tactile reaction.  Nothing to hide.

And that is where I fit-  I am more interested in the forms and surfaces and lines I need to make and explore as I relate to the material.  These elements are always altered by the different clays I use. (The "B-mix" discussion at some other time- maybe on the PrattMWP blog.)  At the same time, I am always thinking backwards- that is, I throw with the firing in my head (my problem is I can't seem throw toward anything other than salt and wood!).  The wood kiln is a tool, an important tool, that's true.  The bodies will respond to the kiln in different ways just as I respond to various clay bodies.  That is what matters.  The dialog within the process- the connections to the material and to the potters that have gone before us;  the beginning to the end.