gail sheffield on wed 18 aug 99
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More pottery. And, more information on pottery since I have, while surfing =
the
net, run across Joe's webpage ( www.uky.edu/artsource/molinaro ) with, among
other items, information on the Quichua rain forest pottery, and another =
website
which has information on the rain forest ceramics and Jatumpamba ceramics, =
again
thanks to Joe ( http//:art.sdsu.edu/ceramicsweb/articles ). The =
Jatumpamba-type
pots can also be seen in a photo on page 51 of the previously cited Ceramics
Monthly article on the Paul Rivet Foundation, November, 1998, issue. That
village was set high on a mountaintop not too far from Cuenca, definitely =
not
your regular tourist stop=21 (Is an individual mountain in the Andes an =
=22Ande?=22).
The details of the process are better discussed in the articles I have
mentioned. But, from a naive, not-a-ceramics-professional viewpoint, I must=
say
it was interesting. Our demonstrator was, as I recall, named Narcisse. She=
had
an overturned pot, maybe 2 1/2 feet high. On that, she plopped a =
considerable
amount of previously kneaded clay. She then stuffed her hand-wrist-half of
forearm down into the middle to make a cavity, then started pulling up the =
clay
on the sides to make the vessel higher. After more or less shaping the =
vessel,
she walked round and round, first one direction, then the reverse, forming =
the
pot/vessel. A human wheel, you might say. The firing is described in the =
cited
article, although we did not observe that. Several of the people on the =
tour
bought these large, heavy, pots. I smugly assumed that they would be =
discarding
them at the airport when rejected by the airlines for these =
a-little-too-bulky
carry-on parcels. Well, they all did it.
As to the rain forest bowls described in my first post, if I may be less =
than
professional (I am trained as an anthropologist), I thought those we saw
demonstrated and were able to purchase were much more aesthetically =
pleasing, to
my degenerate Western eye, than the ones shown in the online articles.
OK, you ceramic purists, end of tale. For the exotically-attracted among =
you,
some more tidbits in the next episode.
Gail Sheffield
Covington, LA
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