Lili Krakowski on sat 12 may 07
This thread has gone on so long, as was commented on, because oxen are being
gored, territoritories defended, and like that.
Vince responded to my post like this:
"I don't think anyone said [slip casting]... was a lesser skill, and this
certainly has
nothing to do with "inventing another caste/class system." That's a bit of
a melodramatic interpretation.
It takes a huge amount of skill to design and create a proper slip-casting
mold to cast a complex form. I certainly acknowledge that. The whole point
here is that slip-casting is an assisted-technology industrial
mass-production process that allows many identical pieces to be cast from
the mold, and that moves the process entirely out of the realm of the
handmade. ...To me, this seems so obvious. Slip casting is a mass-production
process,
and even if the process is completed from original to casting by a solo
artist in his/her own studio, it's still inherently a mass-production
process, and it's not appropriate to say that the resulting cast form is
handmade."
And someone wrote me offlist would I explain this comment I made:
"'As to all you talented lovely skilled people who slipcast! WHEN OH WHEN
are you going to pull yourselves together ... and start fighting back?'....
One thing that really bothers me [the author of that post] is the way
potters look down at people
who cast. I can't tell you how many times I've had a great long
conversation going with a potter, and when they learn that I don't "throw"
the conversation suddenly ends! Grrr....
...,[W]e ALL are artists in our
own way. Everything that all of us do IS HANDMADE."
Ok. Of course, pun or no pun, it IS inventing yet another caste system to
say "Them there what works like this is the real true potters, and them
there what works another way, ain't" We have gone, keep going around this
worn-out mulberry tree . Where does process start? What does the process
involve? Is moving from a kickwheel to a motorized one, from checking the
kiln temp by color to using cones, to using digitally programmed kilns a
descent into "...an assisted-technology industrial mass-production process"
Of course it is! As much as moving our glaze puttering experiments into the
lab, as much as using pug mills and slab rollers, and refined chemicals and
mined/cleaned/refined clays is!
As Vince well knows I have protested, always will protest anything and
everything that distracts from the finished work. That is why, despite
accusations of being anti-Intellectual and anti-Academic, I protest all
these requirements and limitations attached to "what is a potter?" I
insist--and no one is as tired of my insisting than I am--that a potter is
one who makes pots. A good potter makes good pots. A great potter makes
fabulous pots. To be a good potter one does NOT need literacy, a
high-school diploma, a college degree, an advanced degree, membership in
pottery/art organizations, the ability to take photographs, the ability to
tango! One needs to be a master in clay.
I disagree with the comment that "we ALL are artists in our own way" because
I still hold to the belief that "artist" is an honorific bestowed on us, not
self-assumed.
And the comment that "everything that all of us do IS HANDMADE" sounds far
truer to me than I think it does to Vince.
Where, as I implied above, does "handmade" begin? Where does it end? Is a
pot still handmade if, as apparently happens at the big Japanese kilns,
special experts, not the potters, fire the kilns?
As to identical pots! I have seen good production potters at work, and they
throw pots only another potter could spot check for non-identical features.
I throw well, and can assure anyone out there I would never have the
patience and temperament to slip cast.
Who exactly is the judge? And of what?
(A woman we knew was married to a neurosurgeon. She told me once that
whenever neurologists and neurosurgeons get together, the conversation turns
into a debate as to who is the real healer. "You with your pills, and
poisons!Ha!" "You knife-happy, slash and burn savages! Phi!" Sounds
familiar?)
Now I have been reading a great great deal about the change to factory
systems--that aspect of the Industrial Revolution. And one of the things
that really went wrong was that the weavers said bad things about the
fullers, and the fullers bad-mouthed the stocking knitters and on and on and
on...By the time they all got their acts together and realized what was
really at stake some 60 years of misery had elapsed.
As craftsmen we ALL fight a daily fight to keep our place in the culture.
As necessary as it may be to get the thing into the oven, splitting hares
helps no one. It is the result that matters. It is the work.
So I think all you highly talented, patient, oft-times amusing slip casters,
since shows are so big a deal nowadays, set up your own shows! Make a point
on ClayArt that next NCECA you want your own corner! Like the other "in"
potters take photos, make videos, give workshops, write Artists
Statements...and learn to tango!
Lili Krakowski
Vince Pitelka on sun 13 may 07
Lili wrote -
> One thing that really bothers me [the author of that post] is the way
> potters look down at people
> who cast.
Dear Lili -
I certainly do not look down on people who slip-cast multiple identical
greenware pieces, as long as they offer their work for sale in appropriate
venues and do not claim that the work is handmade. No one NEEDS to be the
judge of this. Pieces that are slip-cast in multiples as greenware are not
handmade, by definition.
You wrote:
> Everything that all of us do IS HANDMADE."
Why would you want to make the word so all-encompassing that it means
absolutely nothing?
You wrote:
> Where does process start? What does the process
> involve? Is moving from a kickwheel to a motorized one, from checking the
> kiln temp by color to using cones, to using digitally programmed kilns a
> descent into "...an assisted-technology industrial mass-production
> process"
> Of course it is! As much as moving our glaze puttering experiments into
> the
> lab, as much as using pug mills and slab rollers, and refined chemicals
> and
> mined/cleaned/refined clays is!
On the contrary, of course it's not. Your comparisons make no sense in this
context. In all of those examples, if the potter is still
forming/constructing the pot with her/his hands, controlling the clay with
her/his own fingers, then the pot is handmade, and none of that other stuff
has a thing to do with it.
You wrote:
> As Vince well knows I have protested, always will protest anything and
> everything that distracts from the finished work.
I think that we all are most interested in the finished work. That IS what
this is all about. Part of the integrity of the finished work in the fine
crafts is the integrety and honesty of process involved in creating the
finished work. That has always been true, and I certainly hope we are not
subverting it now. Processes evolve, and new tools and equipment appear all
the time, but handmade is handmade is handmade is handmade, and there's no
defensible justification for calling a slipcast piece handmade. The results
can still be very beautiful, but let's just be honest about the process.
I do not see how your discussion of what makes someone a potter is relevant
here. I don't think that anyone implied that an individual studio artist
who slipcasts pots is not a potter. Why wouldn't they be?
You wrote:
> Where, as I implied above, does "handmade" begin? Where does it end? Is
> a
> pot still handmade if, as apparently happens at the big Japanese kilns,
> special experts, not the potters, fire the kilns?
Oh Lili. What a question. Forgive me for the capitals, but OF COURSE it is
still handmade. Who fires it has absolutely nothing to do with the
discussion. I can hand-make a pot, and then George Bush can finish it,
bisque-fire it, glaze it, and glaze-fire it, and the result is still
handmade. It would probably be a piece of crap, but it would be handmade,
because it started out handmade in the greenware stage. That's where the
"hand-making" takes place. The rest is hand-finishing.
You wrote:
> As to identical pots! I have seen good production potters at work, and
> they
> throw pots only another potter could spot check for non-identical
> features.
Again, that has nothing to do with the discussion. Either it is handmade or
it's not. A potter with the skill to throw pots that are almost identical
is still hand-making them. Someone who slip-casts them is not.
> Who exactly is the judge? And of what?
There is no judge. There doesn't need to be a judge. There's nothing to
judge. By definition, multiples produced from molds are not handmade.
- Vince
Vince Pitelka
Appalachian Center for Craft, Tennessee Technological University
Smithville TN 37166, 615/597-6801 x111
vpitelka@dtccom.net, wpitelka@tntech.edu
http://iweb.tntech.edu/wpitelka/
http://www.tntech.edu/craftcenter/
John Rodgers on mon 14 may 07
I know, I know, I said I would have no more to say about this - but I
have got to tell ya - I love this conversation. This whole thread about
molds, slip-casting, throwing, has been invigorating. It just goes to
show the range of the skills and the scope of the craft that is out there.
In-so-far as a pat definition of "handmade" - Vince, I think you stopped
short of the true definition, and did a dis-service to all the
slipcasters in the world who are feeling a bit like second class clay
citizens up next to wheel throwers. . Just because you squish the clay
in your hands on a wheel does not necessarily make it "handmade". To
exclude the slip casters because of their molds, one must exclude the
thrower because of their wheel. I know, I know, you already tried to
justify the wheel in an earlier post, but no matter. The only TRUE
handmade pieces are those that ARE NOT made by machine assistance. Those
wonderful pinch pots, and coiled pots that I often see - those are
"handmade" by any definition.
Pots formed on a wheel are to be included in the true handmade group???
I don't think so.
I often throw pots on my wheel and never touch the clay with my hands
except to weigh it and shape it into a ball - and they are not jiggered
nor jollyed. After that, I use tools on it to shape it. If I use my hand
on the clay directly, I've done nothing more than use one more
available tool. I can as easily use a wood rib or wooden thumb. If the
pot is made on a wheel, and I've not touched it with my hands, only
wooden tools, trimmers, and gouges, does it still qualify as "handmade"?
And where in the grand scheme of things would fall those "slip-cast but
altered by hand" pieces?
No, I don't consider pottery thrown on a wheel to be truly "handmade".
In fact, in my view it should not even be considered at all, no more
than molded things. I think the coiled and the pinched should bear the
title "Handmade", not wheel thrown pottery nor molded stuff.
I know, I know. This debate could go on forever. Every one has their
point of view and are not going to yield an inch.
The real bottom line here is financial. If we could not sell our craft,
about 50 % of us would disappear over night. Putting demarcation lines
all over the place is another way of delineating onself from the rest of
the crowd in order to get a leg up on the competition. Beyond that, who
gives a hoot. My stuff sells - slip cast, thrown, pinched, coiled,
whatever. I tell people what it is, and what it is not. and they buy it.
And in my whole experience, not one time have I ever lost a sale
because something was slip cast vs thrown on a wheel. Didn't make one
whit's difference. The truth was told, the client liked it, and they
bought it. That is the key. Promote your work for what it is, as
something they will like and enjoy, however it is created. And make sure
that when they take home their newly acquired object d'art that they
understand they are taking home a bit of the artist.
Best regards,
John Rodgers
Chelsa, AL
Vince Pitelka wrote:
> Lili wrote -
>> One thing that really bothers me [the author of that post] is the way
>> potters look down at people
>> who cast.
>
> Dear Lili -
> I certainly do not look down on people who slip-cast multiple identical
> greenware pieces, as long as they offer their work for sale in
> appropriate
> venues and do not claim that the work is handmade. No one NEEDS to be
> the
> judge of this. Pieces that are slip-cast in multiples as greenware
> are not
> handmade, by definition.
>
> You wrote:
>> Everything that all of us do IS HANDMADE."
>
> Why would you want to make the word so all-encompassing that it means
> absolutely nothing?
>
> You wrote:
>> Where does process start? What does the process
>> involve? Is moving from a kickwheel to a motorized one, from
>> checking the
>> kiln temp by color to using cones, to using digitally programmed kilns a
>> descent into "...an assisted-technology industrial mass-production
>> process"
>> Of course it is! As much as moving our glaze puttering experiments into
>> the
>> lab, as much as using pug mills and slab rollers, and refined chemicals
>> and
>> mined/cleaned/refined clays is!
>
> On the contrary, of course it's not. Your comparisons make no sense
> in this
> context. In all of those examples, if the potter is still
> forming/constructing the pot with her/his hands, controlling the clay
> with
> her/his own fingers, then the pot is handmade, and none of that other
> stuff
> has a thing to do with it.
>
> You wrote:
>> As Vince well knows I have protested, always will protest anything and
>> everything that distracts from the finished work.
>
> I think that we all are most interested in the finished work. That IS
> what
> this is all about. Part of the integrity of the finished work in the
> fine
> crafts is the integrety and honesty of process involved in creating the
> finished work. That has always been true, and I certainly hope we are
> not
> subverting it now. Processes evolve, and new tools and equipment
> appear all
> the time, but handmade is handmade is handmade is handmade, and
> there's no
> defensible justification for calling a slipcast piece handmade. The
> results
> can still be very beautiful, but let's just be honest about the process.
>
> I do not see how your discussion of what makes someone a potter is
> relevant
> here. I don't think that anyone implied that an individual studio artist
> who slipcasts pots is not a potter. Why wouldn't they be?
>
> You wrote:
>> Where, as I implied above, does "handmade" begin? Where does it
>> end? Is
>> a
>> pot still handmade if, as apparently happens at the big Japanese kilns,
>> special experts, not the potters, fire the kilns?
>
> Oh Lili. What a question. Forgive me for the capitals, but OF COURSE
> it is
> still handmade. Who fires it has absolutely nothing to do with the
> discussion. I can hand-make a pot, and then George Bush can finish it,
> bisque-fire it, glaze it, and glaze-fire it, and the result is still
> handmade. It would probably be a piece of crap, but it would be
> handmade,
> because it started out handmade in the greenware stage. That's where the
> "hand-making" takes place. The rest is hand-finishing.
>
> You wrote:
>> As to identical pots! I have seen good production potters at work, and
>> they
>> throw pots only another potter could spot check for non-identical
>> features.
>
> Again, that has nothing to do with the discussion. Either it is
> handmade or
> it's not. A potter with the skill to throw pots that are almost
> identical
> is still hand-making them. Someone who slip-casts them is not.
>
>> Who exactly is the judge? And of what?
>
> There is no judge. There doesn't need to be a judge. There's nothing to
> judge. By definition, multiples produced from molds are not handmade.
> - Vince
>
> Vince Pitelka
> Appalachian Center for Craft, Tennessee Technological University
> Smithville TN 37166, 615/597-6801 x111
> vpitelka@dtccom.net, wpitelka@tntech.edu
> http://iweb.tntech.edu/wpitelka/
> http://www.tntech.edu/craftcenter/
>
> ______________________________________________________________________________
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>
>
Vince Pitelka on tue 15 may 07
John Rodgers wrote
> In-so-far as a pat definition of "handmade" - Vince, I think you stopped
> short of the true definition, and did a dis-service to all the
> slipcasters in the world who are feeling a bit like second class clay
> citizens up next to wheel throwers. Just because you squish the clay
> in your hands on a wheel does not necessarily make it "handmade". To
> exclude the slip casters because of their molds, one must exclude the
> thrower because of their wheel. I know, I know, you already tried to
> justify the wheel in an earlier post, but no matter. The only TRUE
> handmade pieces are those that ARE NOT made by machine assistance. Those
> wonderful pinch pots, and coiled pots that I often see - those are
> "handmade" by any definition.
> Pots formed on a wheel are to be included in the true handmade group???
> I don't think so.
Oh my god John, do we really have to go through this? It's getting into the
realm of the completely ridiculous. OF COURSE pots made on the wheel are
hand made. The only thing that the wheel does is provide rotary motion.
All the rest of the forming is done by the potters hands and by tools held
by the potter's hands. There is absolutely no rational comparison to
slipcasting, where you cast identical multiples from a mold. OF COURSE
wheel-thrown pots are handmade, by definition. OF COURSE mold-cast pots are
not handmade, by definition. Why am I beating my head against the wall on
this if people are going to come up with such patently absurd, indefensible
arguements? Come on man, MAKE SENSE!
There is no reason that the slip-casters should feel marginalized. They
have made the choice to use an assisted-technology mass-production process
in their studio work, and all they have to do is accept responsibility for
that, and not call their work handmade. There are still plenty of venues
where the work will sell just fine if it is good work. The fact that
someone uses slip-casting is no value-judgement of the finished product as
long as the maker is honest about the means of production, and doesn't try
to pass the work off as handmade in any venue that is supposed to be for
handmade work.
You wrote:
> I often throw pots on my wheel and never touch the clay with my hands
> except to weigh it and shape it into a ball - and they are not jiggered
> nor jollyed. After that, I use tools on it to shape it. If I use my hand
> on the clay directly, I've done nothing more than use one more
> available tool. I can as easily use a wood rib or wooden thumb. If the
> pot is made on a wheel, and I've not touched it with my hands, only
> wooden tools, trimmers, and gouges, does it still qualify as "handmade"?
Of course it does, because you have regulated the tools to make a one-of a
kind piece, where all the forming has been controlled by your hands. Once
you make a slip-casting mold, there is no such decision making or regulating
of the indivdiual greenware object other than deciding howl long to leave
the slip in the mold and how to clean up the mold lines. Isn't this pretty
obvious John?
You wrote:
> And where in the grand scheme of things would fall those "slip-cast but
> altered by hand" pieces?
If individual components are press-molded or slip-cast, and then they are
altered and assembled so that every finished piece is unique, then of course
the finished product is handmade. Really, the distinction is so simple.
Any process where multiple identical pieces are reproduced by a mechanical
process (including slip-casting), the finished piece is by definition not
handmade. There's no wiggle-room on that. Either it's handmade or it's
not, and slipcast greenware multiples are NOT handmade, unless you choose to
completely misinterpret the word.
You wrote:
> I know, I know. This debate could go on forever. Every one has their
> point of view and are not going to yield an inch.
It's not a question of my point of view, or me yielding. This is not my
point of view. It is a fact, based on definition of terms. Mass-produced
pieces are not handmade, and identically slip-cast pieces are mass-produced,
even if done by an individual artist in their studio from a mold that they
made. It's still a mass-production process, and the resulting pieces are
not handmade. My opinion on the subject is not part of this conversation.
Again - the statement that slip-cast multiples are not handmade is not my
opinion - it is a fact based on definition of terms.
You wrote:
> The real bottom line here is financial. If we could not sell our craft,
> about 50 % of us would disappear over night. Putting demarcation lines
> all over the place is another way of delineating onself from the rest of
> the crowd in order to get a leg up on the competition.
No, not at all. It is a matter of honesty. No one should be able to sell
their work as handmade unless it really is.
You wrote:
> Beyond that, who
> gives a hoot. My stuff sells - slip cast, thrown, pinched, coiled,
> whatever. I tell people what it is, and what it is not. and they buy it.
> And in my whole experience, not one time have I ever lost a sale
> because something was slip cast vs thrown on a wheel. Didn't make one
> whit's difference. The truth was told, the client liked it, and they
> bought it. That is the key.
Yes, that is the key. You are honest about the means of production, and the
customer buys the work anyway. That's fine. Just accept the fact that your
slip-cast pieces are not handmade, while everything else (including your
thrown work) is handmade. Let's just agree not to subvert the tradition of
handmade work by calling something handmade when it's not. That's really
what this whole conversation is all about.
- Vince
Vince Pitelka
Appalachian Center for Craft, Tennessee Technological University
Smithville TN 37166, 615/597-6801 x111
vpitelka@dtccom.net, wpitelka@tntech.edu
http://iweb.tntech.edu/wpitelka/
http://www.tntech.edu/craftcenter/
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