Jenny Lewis on sat 4 oct 97
David -
3 cheers for oval bowls! One of my tutors used to point out to us
that once we got the stuff home it would not be placed on a record
player, so stop spinning it around and watching the wobbles.
Another tutor reduced the whole class to shrieks and giggles, when he
tried to explain about throwing and altering/joining/etc, and said
in all seriousness "After all, when you throw, you know you are
always going to end up with a perfect round pot..." and the
shrieks drowned out the rest of the sentence.
I learned to slide pots off (easy-ish) and to lift them (STILL not
too good at that) and didn't use bats for years. I think the bats
help a little, to make life that bit easier for some things, but very
pleased I learned the way I did.
However, in the summer I did a throwing week and tried to make huge
(well, big-ish) pots so used bats helped. Trying to learn the
technique of throwing, then adding a coil and throwing more. I know
I need lots of practiCe, and wish I had more time to practiSe,
but... can anyone offer any little helpful hints on this please?
Whenever I started throwing the coils up, the shape went berserk,
even though I kept the wheel going fairly slowly to try to stop the
flaring outwards. These were meant to be fairly straight sided
garden pots. A small amount of tapering would be ok, but not a
sudden crazy lunge out into space...
It was very enjoyable (and exhausting) though. Small is beautiful,
but big was good fun!
Jenny Lewis,
still overlooking Regents Park
and still trying to go home after a scratchy sort of week
Unruly JuliE on mon 6 oct 97
Jenny,
When I throw large, I throw in sections. Since I have problems
centering more than 5lbs. at a time, that is what I use for each
section. First I will throw a thickish "bowl / cylinder" shape.
I will leave this on the bat, measuring the width of the opening
on the outside. Then I center and open to the bat (no bottom)
another 5lbs. The top of this has to measure the same on the
outside as the top of the piece with the bottom. Angle cut the
edges so when adjoining they will fit snugly together (see
drawing). Leaving this also attached to the bat, I let them sit
and get stiff (this is where there is a learning curve!). I then
ajoin the two peices by scoreing and wetting the tops and sticking
together, twisting the top one to creat somewhat of a
stick-to-itive-ness. Once they are goodly "stuck" together, I cut
the bat off the top peice (which is now upside down, see
drawing). I then thin out the walls by pulling up in the normal
fasion, being careful not to get the bottom peice to wet (it can
fall). I have made a few three-peice vases and two peice large
bowls this way.
_________________ <---- bat (second 5lb peice w/out bottom
|| || turned upside down
onto
||
|| first
peice) || ||
\|
|/
|| ||
<------------- angle cut / joint
-----------> || ||
|/|
|| ||
||
||
|| ||
||
||
|| ||
____|======|_______ <--- bat (first 5lb peice --->
________|--------------|_______
with
bottom)
This has taken me 2-3 days total, as I let it dry on its own
between stages and can only work in clay in the evenings. I think
this is much easier than the coil method, at least for me.
hope this helps,
Julie
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