Cups and mugs

I made several mugs and cups beyond the sake cup from yesterday, but I only kept a few. I gave most of them away.

The mug you see here was an early attempt; it's very heavy, both in weight and in glaze.

This tea cup is purposefully handle free, and had its rim dipped in a glaze called "waterfall". I rather like the effect. I use this mug almost daily. It was a precursor to the porcelain, done in Danish Plain. I made another one that looks much like it in porcelain that I gave away.

The inside of the tea cup.

Top of my best "form". The glaze on this mug was an utter failure. But as my last thrown mug, it's shape was far better than the others. It's not too heavy and the walls are fairly consistent in thickness.

Here you can see the horrible glazing. I went from being too heavy-handed with my glazing to being far too light. It would have been a great mug otherwise.

Here you see the bottom. Notice the nice shaping at the bottom of the handle?

Another handle free tea cup.It's much heavier than the one above.Still very usable, as you can see.

Some Ceramics

I took a beginner's wheel ceramics class last year. I always wanted to learn ceramics, but the last time I handled clay was in 1995 when I took a sculpture class. I was fairly good at it, but transporting my projects without a car was sheer hell. I didn't have a car again and an inclination to pursue a class until lately.

I'm not used to things being very difficult. Motivation is difficult for me, not execution, I find. Therefore I was practically traumatized the first half of my first class by how hard wheel ceramics was turning out to be. (No pun intended. :P) Also, it's messy. Me and messy aren't really friends, I don't care if you've seen my closet. I don't like my hands gooey. So I was having a near OCD experience, as well. I had to get over that... for the most part.

By the second day I had it well enough for my blood pressure to drop back to it's normal low. (Maybe that's why get-up-and-go is a problem for me... my blood pressure usually causes nurses to say, "How do you feel? Are you tired? Do you mind if we try this again?")

I started with Danish Sand, which has a neighbor called Danish Plain, who is sand-free. I went this route instead of more earthy clay because I made it clear to the instructor from the get-go that my aim was porcelain. I love Asian pottery. I would be thrilled to make a perfect celadon bowl. If I started with Danish Sand and then moved on to Danish Plain he thought I would be fairly well prepared for the feel of porcelain.

Three small pieces: brown bowl, white bowl, and sake cup

Bowl of Danish Plain clay, about 3" wide

My best piece is the porcelain sake cup I made near the end. I am both frugal and stubborn, and I have small hands, so I was not daunted at all by trying small pieces. It's about 1 1/2" in diameter.

Inside view of sake cup. This is fairly true to color - it's greenish.

Bottom of sake cup. The footing on this is about 1/8" wide. The outer graze is blue-gray.

After I used up the Danish clay, I got some coarser clay to try to knock out some quick pieces. This bowl was one result. I was unhappy with how it trimmed up, so I did some carving on it to cover it up. The glaze dripped a bit, but at least it dripped consistently. :P

Earthenware bowl, about 4" wide

Bottom of earthenware bowl

There are more pieces as well, but I don't want to inundate the blog with photos all in one sitting. More on the other pieces later.