Newsletter - Scottish Potters Association

SCOTTISH POTTERS ASSOCIATION
Newsletter
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SUMMER 2016
Chair’s letter
Anne Lightwood
SPA at the Fringe A Mad Hatter’s Tea
Party
2016
Kindrogan
Book Review
Potfest
Adverts & Notices
Kindrogan 2016
WWW.SCOTTISHPOTTERS.ORG
Chair Letter - Camilla Garrett - Jones
Chairs letter Summer 2016
What a great time we all had at Kindrogan, with three great demonstrators, a fantastic Ceilidh and fab
costumes! Congratulations to the Owl and the Pussycat and the Kindrogan award winners, Roose
Eisma, Alice Buttress, and Miriam Reid. The Charity Auction for Cancer Relief and Adopt a Potter
raised a fantastic £756 (+ extra through Gift Aid) so many thanks go to Val Burns for organising it.
The raffle raised £405 for SPA funds. So thank you all who contributed items to both and all those
who purchased tickets and pots.
It is with great sadness that we lost one of our founding members, Anne Lightwood. I have also heard about the deaths of Orkney based potter David Holmes and also Wales based Morgan Hall who
demonstrated for SPA some years back.
With the summer (hopefully) starting soon, the two main events coming up are Potfest at Scone in
June and the Mad Hatters Potting Tea Party at the Fringe in August. We are still looking for helpers
for both these events, so please let Mina Rusk know if you can help at Potfest and put your name
down for the doodle poll for Mad Hatters, details on page 4. You don’t need to have a huge ceramic
knowledge to help! Both these events are about encouraging the public to have a go at pottery,
whatever their age.
Most of you will have heard by now that there is to be another series of the Pottery Throw Down.
Fingers crossed for the SPA contestants who have applied!
I would like to thank all those on the committee who have left this year for all their hard work. Also a
big thanks to Katy Low for all her work organising Kindrogan bookings for the last 11 years! I would
also like to welcome all the new committee members, listed at the back. I am still looking for a ViceChair who can replace me as Chair next March, so please let me know if you would like to take on
this role. It would be much easier for all if you can start now!
Camilla
Opening of the ‘
Still Life’ Exhibiton
at Milton Gallery,
Banchory.
Anne Lightwood 2.12.1936 - 8.3.2016
I was lucky enough to be one of Anne’s apprentices – she had many, and was always encouraging and very open with her information. But,
let’s start at the beginning of what was to be a
very creative career. She studied at Edinburgh
College of Art from 1954 – 58 getting a DA in
Mural Painting with Printed Textiles and Stained
Glass. Having met and married Donald they
moved to London where from 1962 – 67 she
was a pottery teacher. Having originally gone to
be taught, by the end of the first term she was
teaching!
In 1967 everyone moved back to Fife, Anne
continued teaching as a visiting Art Teacher,
Craft teacher at St Leonards in St Andrews and
a lecturer at Glenrothes and Buckhaven Technical College.
In 1972 she established Largo Pottery and I
vividly remember her telling me that to check
that the everything was OK in the kiln that she
had built (as you did in those days) she lit the
gas on a low flame and sat inside the kiln with
the door shut! At Largo she made thrown functional stoneware that was fired in a gas kiln.
Unfortunately in 1984 Largo Pottery was destroyed by fire.
Anne demonstrating at Kinfauns (where SPA
weekends were held before Kindrogan)
In the same year she re-established her pottery
in St Andrews first with George Young at
Church Square Ceramics then later in her own
premises down a vennel off South Street – a
magical place. Anne’s focus of making had
changed as arthritis had taken its toll on her
joints and she started making press mould
plates and dishes (amongst other things) using
coloured clay – millefiori.
During her time in St Andrews she did several
commissions – large wall pieces at
1998 at Liniclate School on Benbecula
1991 at Stirling Royal Infirmary
1996 at Garrick Hospital Stranraer
Last big piece Anne finished for her daughter.
I started working with Anne in 1991 making
bowls out of 36 circles – well sometime a few
more, on a press mould. She quickly allowed
me to make using her techniques with the coloured clay. George, May (an earlier apprentice
now lecturer, Anne and I would go to the International potters camp at Aberystwyth ( now the
International Ceramics Festival) and at one of
these a Potter from New Zealand – Brian Gartside came on stage and made a suitcase with
sheets of paper clay he had made and brought
with him in his luggage.
Anne Ligthwood
Anne was intrigued and started using
paperclay to make platters and all
sorts of pieces, this led in turn to her
becoming an author of the book Paperclay and other additives – which
was published in 2000.
In 2003 Anne sold her pottery in
South Street and moved into a purpose built studio in the back garden
of her house where she continued to
make pots and plaques and other
paper clay pieces well into last year.
Anne never stopped learning or being
inquisitive and in 2006 she did an MA
in General Arts at St Andrews University completing it around 2010.
Anne was a stalwart of the Scottish
Potters Association having been one
of the early instigators and having
served on the committee in many
ways including being Chairperson,
and was immensely important in
making the 30th Anniversary Exhibition happen at the Royal Botanic Gardens in Edinburgh.
She was a key person in the AAA
(Association for Applied Arts) – helping raise funds to show how important small creative industries were
to the Scottish Economy, and I’m
sure that we wouldn’t have Craft
Scotland and Creative Scotland without the sterling work that was carried
out by the AAA.
Of course there was also her love of
plants, apparent in her own garden
and also in the support she gave to
the St Andrews Botanic Gardens.
Anne’s energy belied her actual
years, and her knowledge, support,
and sheer love of life, will be sadly
missed by all who knew her.
Fiona Duckett
Anne demonstrating at the SPA 30th Anniversary Event
Events
A call out for helpers at this fun event!
The aim is to show the Fringe public how much fun
we all have with clay! And we have fun too!
We hope to get a Meet the Maker grant from Craft
Scotland to pay key leaders at the event, so we
need members who can demonstrate and teach
either hand building or throwing. We also need voluntary help.
Accommodation available.
Please go to the doodle poll below to register your
interest http://doodle.com/poll/ekr9t8ney2rm273s
SPA at Potfest Scotland
This year we are offering demonstrations and a hands on opportunity for the public.
We are still looking for volunteers to help at Scone on one of
the days- 10th to 12th June.
If you can help with demonstrating, teaching throwing or on
the stand, Please contact Mina Rusk
at [email protected]. All helpers get Free entry!
Kindrogan Award 2016
First
prize Roose
Eisma
Second
prize Alice
Buttress
‘Rock a
by baby’
‘There
was an
old woman..’
Third
prize Miriam
Reid
‘There
was a
crocked
man’
Kindrogan Demonstrations - David Cohen
Well here I am, Kindrogan. I cannot tell you
how excited I am. Since joining the SPA a year
ago and having attended a few workshops now,
all I have been hearing is Kindrogan this,
Kindrogan that, “oh didn’t you make Kindrogan
last year? What a pity”. I was beginning to think
that no matter what plans I made (tied husband
to the kitchen sink and sold my first born etc.)
there were forces beyond my control that were
preventing me from getting to Enochdhu.
But Yes!! With feet firmly roaming the vast corridors of Kindrogan Field Studies Centre I can
now be one of those SPA members who have
joined the Kindrogan fan club.
Knowing in advance who the Demonstrators
were going to be, Dave Cohen, Lucienne
Lasalle and Carolyn Genders, I thought it would
give me a clear indication as to where my preferences lay as each worked in different media,
Throwing, Sculpture and Hand Building, but
then one by one we were given a presentation
showing past and present work giving us an insight to their working methods. Our Guests
were going to demonstrate over two days, at
the same time, in different parts of Kindrogan.
(Not giving me enough time to clone myself, so
I could watch them all) As much as I wanted to
be greedy and see everyone, my heart was set
on Dave Cohen, a fellow Thrower.
Now sitting, with camera and notebook at the
ready, poised for some great insight, holding
my breath, as was the packed room, wanting
very much for Dave Cohen to start. Before me
was this big hulk of a guy wearing a brilliant
apron of many colours, making you instantly
smile.
I don’t think he will mind me saying that at 83
years young he can still command a room by
saying very little, but when he did everyone was
quick to write some little snippet down. Dave
started by telling us about the mechanics of
throwing clay, “what happens to one side will
automatically happen to the other ”. He took us
back to basics, to include the beginners
amongst us, talking about how to protect yourself against injury by using soft clay. Once the
clay was wedged and kneaded, Dave guided us
through the different stages of pulling a tall cylinder, the starting point of most classic shapes.
His advice at this stage was to “slow down,
know what shape you want to achieve, and by
using a mirror get the true outline of the pot ”.
Kindrogan Demonstrations - David Cohen
We were then treated to an effortless throw and pull
of a large vase which was then dried with an electric heat gun to allow for Dave to incorporate a swirl
pattern into the clay and to trim immediately if required.
Catastrophe struck when Dave was asked to once
again show us how to pull a tall cylinder and it collapsed on him, he just laughed it off, it happens.
For the rest of the day we were given a Masterclass
on different throwing forms and methods, jugs
showing both convex and concave shapes within
the same pot and what clays to use for Raku etc.
Midmorning was all about extended throwing, making a piece to be added to the next day .Can ’t wait!
Next a lidded pot with gallery was thrown into the
mix, created without any drama, but oh so perfect.
3½ Ibs of clay was thrown down, made into a vase
shape then squeezed gently with wooden boards, a
slimmer version, beautiful! But no, this is not
enough for Dave Cohen, he then gives us the finale
by placing his mouth over the pot and blows it up
like a balloon. Applause!
The audience were then encouraged for requests, a
large plate, a large bowl maybe. He settled for a
very large platter, which was looking lovely until,
yes, you’ve guessed it, ‘floppy hat platter’. Dave
brushed it aside as we all went ‘aahh’, saying he
hadn’t made one in years.
Next day was the much anticipated joining of the
extended form, a large vase made from the day before, dried and ready to be introduced to the new
softer pot. The softer clay allowing for another pull
once joined, completing the whole piece. This became an ornamental jug. It was lovely to watch
Dave, how he allowed his arms to move loosely, in
no hurry to achieve what he had set out to do.
It would soon be lunch time and very soon time to
go home. Before that though there was the lidded
jar to be trimmed, the lid to be fitted with handle,
smoothed and put together and more, and more requests.
He asked “What do people want to see?” He was
very gracious, we just wanted to watch him. Being
one of the people, I made no requests, happy in the
knowledge that I had witnessed a true Artisan and
felt privileged to have been there.
Can’t wait for the next time.
Elaine Pollitt
Kindrogan Demonstration - Carolyn Genders
“MORE IS MORE”
Punchy, colourful, vibrant, quirky – Adjectives
that apply to both Carolyn and her ceramics.
Carolyn (CG) studied at Brighton, where she
graduated with a BA Hons in Wood, Metal,
Ceramics and Plastics. She went on to Goldsmiths, London to do a Post Grad. Diploma
in Ceramics. She set up her studio in 1980,
specialising in Ceramics and Printmaking.
Love of colour, texture, landscape, space
and form is stamped firmly on her work. I
joined CG’s demonstration, for what was to
be a fascinating two days. Jana Grimm ably
assisted.
Day 1 – To achieve the look and form of her
distinctive pots, Carolyn prefers to coil.
Throwing is too symmetrical and slab too
regimented, for her. Molochite 30 is added
for texture, to white earthenware clay. The
pieces will be fired to 1140 centigrade to
achieve vitrification.
CG works fast using fat coils of fresh clay,
there is no need to score (unless the pot is
left for a while to firm up). She uses a down
stroke on the inside then follows with an upstroke outside and a final upstroke on the
inside. The upstrokes add height as she
works. She builds up from a thick base,
which steadies her pot. This will be scraped
down at a later stage. She builds a series of
pots at a time - it’s important to work in
groups of forms and groups of colour. “I like
clay because I find it difficult”. CG bends the
form as she goes. “Imperfections give the pot
life”. She strives at getting a pot that looks
LIGHT. “Never stop pushing yourself and
see where you can go”.
Day 2 – It seems that CG approaches dancing with the same gusto that she applies to
her art and joined in enthusiastically with
SPA’s lively ceilidh, the previous evening.
On Sunday, we re-joined for her demonstration on vitreous slips (VS). CG first discovered VS through Ken Bright, her tutor at
Goldsmiths. (VS are not suitable for domestic ware).
Kindrogan Demonstration - Carolyn Genders
CG sketches and mixes colour palettes on paper
before she starts. Defining decisions is important.
She has fully scraped back her pots and left them
to dry. As there is glaze included, CG leaves them
a bit longer than leather hard.
VS are half way between a glaze and a slip. She
has honed her slip recipes over many years and
encourages potters to test and experiment. As a
rough guide CG uses the base clay for the slip to
ensuring compatibility, adds frit and/or transparent
glaze powder (Can be up to 50%), stain (up to
20%)- making the colour strong and up to 20% oxides for variation in colour, as stains on their own
can be flat. Adds water and stirs to a consistency
of single yoghurt. Leave to settle and pour off water. Stir back to the right consistency when ready to
use. Use it thickly or like watercolour. It’s a painterly medium, where “more is more”. She makes
reference to Mark Rothko, abstract expressionist.
Remember that you are painting in a negative palette and not actual colour. To dry off the wetted slip
clay, fire the green earthenware up to 300 centigrade very slowly, switch off overnight. Then start
again.
Design is about space and how the shapes work
together. She blocks in the pots, painting in layers
of white, yellow // red, black or a variety of base colours. Always paint in different directions. She
paints on coloured shapes, uses paper stencils,
wax resist, she sponges, rolls, brushes. She
scrapes back some areas, adding thicker areas and
lines elsewhere to give the pot guts and depth.
The end results are spectacular, the form and the
abstract colour designs, marry beautifully. The
whole pot is painted; inside, outside and underneath (the slip content prevents the pot from sticking to the kiln). CG was interesting, fun and you
leave bursting with a desire to create.
Kate Doughty
Kindrogan Demonstration - Lucianne Lassalle
Its nine o’clock in the morning, the demonstration is about to start, and Lucianne and her
assistant, Roose, is busy drying out slabs of
clay with a hairdryer. The slabs were cut the
night before, straight from the bag, no wedging required, and left to dry ready for the
morning. Unfortunately the clay is still a bit on
the damp side, but Lucianne decides to start
anyway. She uses a ‘premium craft crank
stoneware’ clay for her sculptures. It’s easy to
fire and she loves the texture of it. ‘You can
wet it down if it’s too dry and just join it together, it doesn’t crack easily and has a low
shrinkage rate, she says’. Building her sculptures from slabs means they are already hollow inside and she can work both from the
outside and the inside to get the shape that
she wants.
On a board on one of the walls she has
pinned sixteen sketches of the human form in
different positions. She uses sketches, photographs and sometimes live models in her
work, but says she goes a lot by feeling, that
she has an instinctual feeling about the shape
and flow of the piece. She is intending to do
two sculptures during this workshop, a standing one and one that is lying down. She starts
by doing the thighs for the lying one. She does
this by shaping the one centimetre thick slabs
in to cones, one for each thigh. She uses this
technique both for making thighs and calves
on her sculptures. A simplified and effective
way of forming the legs.
Next she makes the torso by joining two slabs
together to form a tube. She makes a bend in
the tube and explains that there is two different dynamics in the form that she is looking
for. The first one is the tilt in the pelvis and the
second one is the pattern that the ribcage
then has to follow for the piece not to fall over.
Sometimes it means adding a shoulder or an
arm to the sculpture for the flow of it to be balanced. She joins the thigh cones to the torso
and uses lumps of clay to prop it up then puts
it to one side to dry off and stabilise, and
starts on the standing piece. Same procedure,
cones for thighs and a tube for the torso.
Kindrogan Demonstration - Lucianne Lassalle
She doesn’t use a lot of tools when she works,
an old ‘butter knife’ to cut away clay, a fork to
rough up the surface for joining, a water sprayer
and some metal kidneys to shape the surface.
She joins all surfaces together as well as she
can, both on the outside and the inside and aims
for the thickness of the walls to be as even as
possible. This is to make sure there is no cracking during the drying or firing process. She
leaves her sculptures to dry for quite a long time,
sometimes for months. Then they get fired slowly, four to five hours at 100 °C, to make sure
they are as dry as possible before firing them up
to 1220°C.
She continues to work, changing between the
two sculptures, this is how she usually works
having several pieces on the go at the same
time. . Lucianne constantly steps away from the
pieces and looks at them from all angles and
from a distance. Looking at the balance of the
form, what direction is it going in, does it need to
change direction?
She talks about the importance of how the
sculpture looks from a distance, what is the eye
drawn to? Is there any dark patches that instantly catches the eye and takes over from the overall impression of the sculpture? She cuts out,
adds on and scrapes, and over the two days,
from square slabs of clay, these two beautiful
female sculptures grow and take shape. It is a
fascinating and inspirational process to watch.
Jill Houghton Slyte
Book Review and New Books
NEW DIRECTIONS IN CERAMICS
Bloomsbury
Jo Dahn
£35.00
This is a book to provoke arguments. What is art and if it is art, is it any good? Dahn writes about international ceramic art development of the last 25 years but the text could equally be applied to most
visual art forms.
The introduction ‘Ceramics In Critical Context’ relies on quoted definitions and interpretations that
can easily be dismissed (excuse the language) as ‘art bollocks’, but is well thought through. I was
particularly impressed at how she related the decline of ceramics at the undergraduate level (or it
being subsumed into 3D design, applied arts or contemporary crafts), to the flourishing of clay as a
medium at postgraduate level or as doctoral research.
The four content chapters are Performance, Installation, Raw Clay and Figurative. These take the
work of individual artists to illustrate the themes, but not in the lazy way of many current books to
save on the effort of analysis. Performance includes the firing of Nina Hole’s buildings and Wali
Hawes car kiln which my leave an end product. It also includes John Park’s spinning plates, the only
record of which is on film. Installation references work by Clare Twomey, Edmund de Waal, Neil
Brownsword and others. To be contentious – which, if any, of these can compete with Anthony
Gormley’s ‘Field For The British Isles’?
Undoubtedly each of you will appreciate, dismiss or even hate different artists work. If it does nothing
else, this book shows that clay is as useful a material as any to extend the boundaries of visual art.
Do not expect it to give you any great insights into the production of domestic or decorative ceramics!
One new direction not included is the ceramic printer.
As usual Bloomsbury production values are first class.
Roger Bell
NEW BOOKS
British Ceramics 1675 - 1825
Gallagher etc
49.95
New Directions In Ceramics
Jo Dahn
35.00
Nouveau Knowledge
Paul Arthur
85.00
The Potters Dictionary
Frank/Janet Hamer 39.00
Roger Bell
Adverts
STUDY CERAMICS @ THE DUNDEE AND ANGUS COLLEGE
The D&A College are offering a range of SQA accredited full time and part time courses with Ceramics as a
Specialism ;
 HNC ART AND DESIGN - JEWELLERY AND CERAMICS/ SQA (Full Time @ Arbroath Campus)
 ART AND DESIGN -CERTIFICATE JEWELLERY AND CERAMICS / SQA (Full Time @Arbroath Campus)
 DAY TIME AND EVENING LEISURE CLASSES
 POTTERY AN INTRODUCTION
Arbroath Campus,
STARTS- Tues 13th Sept 2016 18h30-20h30 (8 wks )
 POTTERY AN INTRODUCTION
Dundee Gardyne Campus, STARTS- Wed 14th Sept 2016 18h30-20h30 (8 wks)
 INTERMEDIATE CERAMICS -Course details below- INSPIRED BY NATURE
Arbroath Campus,
STARTS- Mon 12th Sept 2016 14h00 -16h30 (8wks)
Dundee Gardyne Campus, STARTS- Wed 14th Sept 2016 14h00 - 16h30 (8wks)
 SUMMER COURSES FOR ALL LEVELS ( To be published on College website shortly)
ALL ENQUIRIES AND REGISTRATION; www.dundeeandangus.ac.uk / ph; 03001231010
LEISURE CLASSES;
FULL TIME STUDY ;
WORKSHOPS CONTENT ;
Karen Cargill; ph; 01241-432600 - 01382-834834
Dermot Curnyn; email- [email protected]
Course tutor, Mary-Ann Orr- email [email protected]
Adverts and notices
Edinburgh Sculpture Workshop Courses
Ceramic Sculpture with Charlotte Barker
Wednesday 4 May – Wednesday 8 June 6.30pm-9pm
5 weeks £185 / 8 places
Over five weeks participants will learn how to coil voluptuous clay forms and slab build geometric sculpture. The
course will also demonstrate how to manipulate ceramic surface techniques such as coloured-clay marbling and
inlay to complete fired and glazed ceramic objects.
Copy, Alter, Replay with Jack Cheetham
Thursday 5 May – Thursday 2 June 6pm-8.30pm
5 weeks £165/ 8 places
This five week course introduces mould-making and casting techniques. Participants will bring a selection of objects and produce casts from these in a range of materials: wax, silicone, plaster, clay and pewter.
Big Jug Saturdays with Charlotte Barker
Saturday 21 May and Saturday 11 June 10am-4pm
10 hours £160/ 8 places
This two-day course will introduce coil-building techniques to make a large jug or vase in the form of a head. Using portraiture as a starting point participants will integrate facial features into their design. The second day will
focus on glazing the jugs with a white tin glaze.
For further information: http://www.edinburghsculpture.org
Pottery Materials & Equipment for sale
Propane fired kiln complete with kiln shelves,
digital pyrometer and all ancillary equipment.
Approximately 1 cu. metre packing space. Reliable and even
firing
Pug mill: Gladstone 3” .75 hp single phase.
Raw materials, glazes, tools, kiln props , plate
racks, Orton cones etc.
For lists and details please email [email protected]
Telephone 01307 850272 ,Oathlaw Pottery& Gallery,by Forfar,
Angus DD8 3PQ
Committee Contacts and Deadlines
Chairperson: Camilla Garrett-Jones
Workshops: Kerstin Gren
[email protected]
[email protected] or
01383 882050
[email protected]
Secretary: Rona Slevin
Membership & Facebook: Robin Palmer
[email protected]
[email protected]
Treasurer: Steve Hay
Website: Michelle Lowe
[email protected]
[email protected]
Exhibitions: Moira Ferguson
Newsletter: Jill Houghton Slyte
[email protected]
[email protected] or
01369 840158
[email protected]
Trainee exhibitions: Mina Rusk
[email protected]
Kate Doughty
[email protected]
Press Officer: Elaine Pollitt
Kathleen Morison
[email protected]
[email protected]
Mary-Ann Orr
Merchandise: Anna Kretsinger
[email protected]
[email protected]
Lynn Pitt
[email protected]
Newsletter Deadlines:
Autumn: 1 July 2016
Winter: 15 October 2016
Spring: 15 January 2017
Summer: 1 April 2017
Photographs in this issue supplied by: Kathleen Morison, Camilla Garett-Jones, Moyra Stewart, & Jill Houghton
Slyte.
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