Glaze test dinner service

JS sent me this picture from our visit to the Royal Worcester museum in the summer. Painted some more glaze saucers and plates, using other plates to clean brushes and mix the glazes. Need firing now. Asked a fellow student what she thought of them, and was told that I can always fire the glaze off if I need to. Cheers.

                                                

Some of the red pieces have ended up looking unintentionally meaty I think. Which reminds me - I've been using turps and fat oil to mix the enamel glazes, and have been wondering about the hideousness of fat oil, and whether I can find an alternative. Will Google it now. Hope I don't discover anything too revolting.

Too many jugs

Lovely visit from Mum. Number of jugs accidentally purchased recently brought sharply into focus, as there are so many she has not seen. In my defence, I need them for my dissertation research. Is is bad that I've arranged them onto different shelves according to whether they are thrown or cast? I think it might be.

Tutorial earlier in the week went OK. Bit of a misunderstanding about a random photograph of a teapot in my sketchbook, which both tutors have latched onto and is not what my throwing project is about at all. Will remove from sketch book and hope is not seared into memory of tutor. I've got to be much quicker with my throwing I think, and break the process down into the different stages. Last pieces much too formal.

In the mean time ventured into the decoration studio. I've been collecting images of glaze test plates from museums and galleries. Like these from the Gladstone Pottery Museum in Stoke.

 

                                 

                                 

Bought lots of 10p Royal Doulton saucers this week to experiment with, and I made glaze test plates. Also going to fire the plate I used to clean my brush on, and the saucers I mixed the glazes on.

Will sort out an enamel kiln tomorrow.

Drawing and throwing

Catching up a bit. Missed a tutorial on Monday and rightly told off twice by tutor. Bit of drawing while I think about what I'm going to do with the list of women in the ceramic industry...

Started some handbuilding that is going nowhere fast, and then some throwing with porcelain. Haven't thrown for three months or more, so all a bit wobbly to start. Made a mini moon jar...

and have left some pieces hanging upside down overnight to see what happens. Don't like them as individual vessels, but like the curves very much and will see if they do anything as a group. Now have odd muscle aches from wedging clay and carrying too many things at once up and down the stairs to the throwing room.

Had a good dissertation tutorial, and now have to plan in some days to get writing.

Accidentally bought a victorian wooden cake stand from antique shop. Bit of a bargain I think. Going to use it for displaying pots at the sales in November. Here it is with three Adam Buick moon jars...

Finally, found this picture of thrower Shozo Michikawa and his dog, and need to find out more. What's going on? Is the dog potting? I want a dog.

Dissertation procrastination

Wednesday went to Stoke for last research trip before writing dissertation. Met up with the second years who were visiting museums, factories and galleries in preparation for their slip casting project. Was meant to join them for a tour of the Dudson factory at lunch time but a university administrative error meant that they weren't expecting us. Luckily had booked a tour of Burleigh for the afternoon, so left the second years, tutors and friendly Dudson security guards for the Middleport factory.

The Burleigh factory is proud to still be using traditional underglaze transfer printing methods, and even some original 19th century machinery to do this. It was fantastically dusty and messy, and I loved it. Our tour guide Gemma was passionate about Burleigh and was a pleasure to listen to. Here's a picture of the transfer paper being printed:

The transferrer has to apply it within two hours of it being printed. Great to see the human face of the world of internet shopping....

The factory building is listed, and is full of now redundant equipment. Rooms full of moulds (they stopped counting at 15,000), now gone out of fashion or collected from closed local factories. Warehouse full of cast hospital equipment such as inhalers and invalid cups, finished just as the NHS moved away from using ceramics. And empty rooms, photographed for the exhibition Breaking the Mould as part of the British Ceramics Biennial in Stoke. This exhibition might imply that Burleigh is an empty building, but it's full of life, history and flowery stuff. Accidentally bought a little black calico jug.

                                             

Thought about the Burleigh building a lot since my visit. What if I was able to exhibit my paintress project in one of the empty rooms? What if I could use some of the transfer designs on some pieces celebrating Burleigh transferrers? What could I do with some of those ceramic inhalers and invalid cups?

Went to see Fresh at the Bridgewater factory, which features recent BA and MA graduate work. Great to see work of Ai Ono and Esther Hubert there. They worked in my studio last year and graduated in July.

See their work at http://aiono.co.uk/ and http://www.estherhubert.co.uk/

Tutorial

Tutorial. Wibbled on a bit, but there were moments of coherence and I'm pleased with my project proposals. Will be working on a piece to celebrate the women workers in the ceramic industry in Britain, past and present. This is my dissertation subject, and whilst writing I’ve collected a long list of women’s names that I want to use. And I'm going to continue with my throwing, and revel in my lack of control. I want to form edges and surfaces for bright, shiny, fluid glazes to pool and drip, and for the pieces to show the energy from the wheel. Time to get messy.

Bunnies and nuns

Tutorial today about my dissertation. Went well. Sometime soon I have to stop the research and start the writing. Have drafted a plan this evening - essay seems to want to be a sequel to Cheryl Buckley's 'Potters and Paintresses'. Have to contact ceramic employment agencies in Stoke about job descriptions and wages, and read more about Midwinter, Meakin and Ruskin factories.

Tried to use new library today. University has managed to build a library where it is impossible to read anything - no quiet area, no big tables to work on, not enough computers. A design classic, at an art and design university. Perhaps they can give themselves some sort of award.

Went to the other campus, and read Andrew Casey's 'Art Deco Ceramics in Britain'. I now know that

• actress Edna Best (Hitchcock's 'The Man Who Knew Too Much') had her own ceramic range.
• Clarice Cliff had a sister called Dolly who was unhappy when her paintresses were compulsorily relocated to the Bizarre decorating shop.
• the designer of Royal Doulton's Bunnykins tableware, Barbara Vernon Bailey, was a nun. Sister Mary Barbara had a duck design up her habit sleeve too, but Royal Doulton didn't want to know.

Wonder if I can squeeze all of these lovely facts into my essay?

Ducks and pots

Weekend in Birmingham. Unpacked four boxes of thrown work Mum has been storing in her loft for me. Spread them out in the garden and did some dremeling. Took these photos from upstairs - they look good from a distance. An eclectic mix: the result of several different projects last year. All for sale in November at markets in Birmingham and Bath.

The big heap of ducklings were in the gardens of a craft centre in Bromsgrove. There was also a depressed kestrel in a cage, but I'm trying not to think about him.