ceramics studio memories, again

you know what's strange? I don't know quite how to write about this, either. I am not one for believing in angels, or any kind of tangible "life after death" I don't believe in ghosts, nothing like that - and I know it's just because I've been thinking about it, but Danner feels so crazy *close* the last few days. I've been obsessing over my ceramics more, and he is very tied up in that for me. The more I think about him and ceramics, the less time seems to have passed between the last time I saw him. Ducky and I have been talking a little bit because of it, and Rebecca and I keep in touch via etsy - I will probably see Char at Jon's funeral, and Janelle will be there - so ceramic people are suddenly *present* in my life the way they haven't been in five years.

I wonder if T ever reads this. She's the one I should have hung on to with all my claws.

I wonder where Fil is, and Morissey, Jeremy..all these people who were SUCH an important part of my life that are just gone now. You know, they are the ones I wish could be at my wedding, for instance - they mattered so much to me for so long. I love the people I work with, but I've only known them a year, so they haven't formed that crazy connection yet. And ceramics was special. Char made it something special. I hope I am not the only one who feels that way.

I remember at closing circle at Not Back to School Camp, Eira said something once that if any of us ever had grandchildren who needed a couch to sleep on, they were welcome at her house, JUST because we had been at NBTSC together. The island trip had something of that same bonded feeling. Just because you had an experience - even if you weren't at the same session or there the same year - you share something special. Ceramics GOT TO ME in that deep down soul altering way, and I don't know how else to commemorate it except keep throwing clay and writing about it on here.

I have to keep remembering how young I was - I started when I was 13 and Char retired when I was 18. That was also the year Grandma died. I lost a lot that year. The five years preceding it made me me. I had pink hair and silver glitter converse and Jeremy introduced me to Tom Waits at the same time that Daniel was making me the same CD's. Char played Bob Dylan while Jon and I raku'd and Les got me the job at Laguna Clay where I met Paul and everyone, and I was surrounded on all sides by clay. I didn't have to do the final because I was the only one to get the other test 100% and Rebecca made me that great Guitar plate (which is hanging in my room) and Mike Lewis introduced me to Nina Simone and Santa Monica, and Mike Duckworth cackled in the background of all of it.

I need to stop this now or it floods. Anyways - Danner, he feels like I just saw him the other day, and ceramics is still as engrained in me as ever.

ceramics

I went to the Irvine Fine Arts Studio again on Saturday to finish glazing the last batch of cups and bowls that I had thrown. At a big studio like that they take forever to get out of the kiln, which means a long lagtime between throwing and getting the finished product.


This first photo is the container that holds the wax resist that you put on the bottom of high fire pieces to prevent the glaze from staying there, so when it melts (glaze is largely glass) in the kiln, it doesn't stick to the kiln shelves and ruin very expensive pieces of kiln furniture.

Then I have some of my cups and bowls all turned upside down ready to get waxed! After you throw a piece, it gets fired once (at roughly 1800 degrees f) and then when it comes out it is considered "bisque" - you rinse it to get rid of any refractory dust, then wax the bottoms, and glaze!

I always have so many pieces to glaze that glazing has never been an exact science for me. A lot of people keep very, very close track of exactly which glaze with which clay and which oxide, etc. that they use. I always start out with good intentions, but by piece 45 I am tired of it! I figure part of the fun is the random surprise joy of seeing what you made after it comes out of the glaze firing. So these are some pieces after they've been glazed, but before they've been fired for the second time. For stoneware, the second firing reaches over 2300 degrees f. This is a photo of the gas kiln used to fire pieces at IFAC. My pieces are actually IN that kiln in the photo - I watched the lab tech load them, then I took the photo.

So anyhoo, such is the life of a piece of clay. I will be picking up some of my pieces tomorrow night, and the rest next week sometime! Yay! I can't wait to post photos.

I am still thinking about Danner, but it's a strange kind of sadness. It doesn't occupy my every waking moment in pain or anything, but I cried myself out one night and now I just feel contemplative. But I am feeling this contemplativeness pretty consistently.

How I can make one day feel like three

Phew! Yesterday was a very long, very wonderful day! I have discovered the key to my having a good weekend - going to sleep by 10pm and waking up before 8am! Friday night I went to my dad's house and watched Top Chef with him, and then had along heart-to-heart. I was at home, asleep by about 10:30. I woke up around 7am the next morning, and spent a few hours happily sweeping, scrubbing, cleaning... then I headed over to Amber's house, where we stopped at Whole Foods, and then went to Aardvark's for clay, and then went down to the Irvine Fine Arts Center!

Now -for those of you who don't know, ceramics has been an obsession of mine since I was about 11. It actually started at the Irv.FAC - we went with Girl Scouts once. I loved it (although the first time I went, I was so excited, I went and got a bucket of water, and set it down on the wheelhead. The first thing they said to do was test the peddle. So I did. And water went FLYING. It was so embarrassing, but I survived.) Then, I was at Cypress College when I was about 13, and walked past this door...

I peered inside, and there was Bob Dylan and Tom Waits playing, murals painted all over the walls, the wheels, and the cubbies, and a big flashing sign that said "CERAMICS" and this silver haired woman with the brightest shirt I ever saw going around and encouraging everyone. I signed up for ceramics the next semester.

That class turned out to be so much more than a class for me. I stayed there for 5 years - they helped raise me. Char and all of the lab techs took me under their wings and taught me everything about throwing, glazing, and firing. Les would help me load the kiln, Ducky would show me how to use the power chisel to clean the shelves, and Jeremy let me raku with him. Oh, rakuing. That's a whole separate post. Oh man. My heart palpitates just thinking about it. Greg Morissey was the handbuilding/low fire glazing expert, Jim used to come up to me when I was learning how to center and thump my elbow and say "oops, center it again" so I learned how to center really well and really fast. John Danner and I started the same semester, and stuck together - he ended up making me some incredibly useful personalized tools, Rebecca, Fil, and Tifani started a little later, and when I met them, my life was complete! Rebecca now lives in Utah, but is still doing ceramics out there (and is thinking of opening her own etsy!) Fil lives who knows where, but apparently resurfaces every once in a while, and Tifani is her own fairytale, which I ruined, and is also another post.

My point is - I loved everything about it. I loved the actual act of throwing, loved the smell of clay, loved sticking my whole arm down in a glaze bucket, loved the old film of Paul Soldner rakuing, loved the day when we got to watch the slides of Char's favorite cups, loved the first day of class ("WOW" day she calld it - for "Weed out the Wusses") I LOVED cleaning that big beautiful silver sink and singing, taking breaks and hanging out on the patio by the aloe vera plant with all the smokers, organizing boxes in the clay cage, helping to load and unload kilns...I loved the precision of loading a glaze kiln, but I loved the bisque kiln because it was so big I could stand in it to load it.

Raku - originally a Japanese form of glazing, was Americanized and made popular by Paul Soldner, known as the Father of American Raku. He also happened to be one of Char's instructors when she was in school. He would come and visit, and every once in a while select students of Char's would get to go to his house for parties, potlucks, and sitting in his hot tub surrounded by the bush that looked like a water monster, and 80 different bonsai trees. I lived for the day Char deemed time to raku. At our studio it was a three person process - and my two favorite parts were definitly actually using the tongs and walking into the kiln to get the pieces, and watching the golden-molten glaze lift off in cotton-candy-thread-like pieces if they were stuck to the kiln shelves, and opening the lid of the reduction barrel - and the backdraft and smoke that would happen every time it opened. I actually lost my eyebrows once from that, and lit my ponytail on fire! Arm hair was a thing of the past. ;oP

Char ran an incredible studio. It was, as she always said she wanted it to be, a mini Utopia in a world where it's hard to find a perfect place.

Then she retired. I stayed on as lab tech for a few semesters after that, but it was too hard for me without her, and without most of the people who had been in class with me for 5 years. I moved to Wisconsin for a little while - found a spot where I did ceramics once, and cried the whole time.

Discovered the Irvine Fine Arts center, and I remember that I hated it the first time I went, for the sheer lack of Bob Dylan music and Char's big booming voice. I pretty much stopped doing any ceramics for a while.

But you know what? I couldn't quit it! I don't do it as much as I used to, that's for sure, but every once in a while my hands just ache for clay. I still get Char's voice about technique in my head when I throw, and I hope I am not forming any bad habits, but throwing for the sake of throwing is now just as enjoyable as it ever was.

However, I STILL HAVEN'T RAKUED SINCE CHAR RETIRED.
ohhh woe, woe, woe..

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wow, I sure left my original post. Okay, I guess that illustrates how much I love ceramics..the point is, getting to go throw yesterday was a very good day for me. Amber and I threw from about 11am-4:30pm when they closed. I had to stop throwing because I ran out of clay, and did handles/trimmed cups for the last two hours. I forgot how quickly I can go through clay. Next time I will be bringing more.
I used Soldate 60 - which was our staple at Cypress College. It takes glaze well, and has enough sand in it that structurally it's fairly easy. Next time I might take some B-mix, just to get some really fancy schmancy glazed pieces.

There was a lady there yesterday that actually knew Char, and we started talking - she said she could see Char's influence in my pieces. I am not sure she meant that as a compliment, but I take it as one - Char was always after my pieces to be more dramatic and have more direction. I felt really good about these cups.

After ceramics, Amber and I went and had some sushi at a new little sushi place in Seal Beach, then got the dog and went for a run on the beach. It's day 2 of week 5 of Couch to 5k, and it wasn't so bad running with Amber. It helped to run on the boardwalk between houses and ocean - I LOVE running in neighborhoods. Imaginging the people who live in each house and looking at their design is what distracts me the best from running. Adam likes the gym so he can watch people and the tv, but that's not distracting enough for me. He also likes the park, which is nice, but I have to retreat really far into my own head for distraction.

By the time I got home, ADAM was also home, which was nice since I hadn't seen him since Wednesday morning. He left at 6am this morning after a good luck kiss for Ventura for his physical exam for the State Parks.

Alrighty, I think this post is now officially four times as long as any reasonable blog post should be. I am going to go get dressed and call Amber - today is a bike ride to the farmer's market, and going to my little sister's performance of And Then There Were None.