The audio file for this article was produced by the Ceramic Arts Network staff and not read by the author.
I woke up one day and realized I’d been at this pottery thing for 30 years. It’s been a meandering path from there to here, “there” being the ceramics studio at the University of Wyoming and “here” being my semi-attached garage studio in Spruce Pine, North Carolina. I wasn’t an art major in college. I spent most of my twenties without direction or purpose. I took my first pottery class almost as an afterthought while pursuing a degree in elementary education. As is often the case with potters, I was immediately hooked. Aside from some intro-level classes at the University of Wyoming, I never really received any formal pottery training. I mostly just picked it up by sitting at the wheel and teaching myself. I started out as a porcelain guy—porcelain with flashing slips in wood kilns, soda kilns, or wood/soda/salt kilns. My early mentors were wood firers, people like Jeff Shapiro, Mary Roehm, and Josh DeWeese (from afar), who were celestial bodies I found myself orbiting around. I think I was mostly attracted to the process of atmospheric firings more than the actual results, but it took me a few years to come to this realization.
I did a post-bac year at Nova Scotia College of Arts and Design (NSCAD) in Halifax. Walter Ostrom once quipped that I had 50 words for brown (He’s very quippy). At NSCAD, I started doodling on my pots, mostly with slips and oxides. Still using porcelain with flashing slips, I was mostly just riffing on Kenzan, Oribe, and Tz’u-chou ware. I had always been a doodler and had sketchbooks filled with drawings of strange people and animals. It never crossed my mind that I could actually incorporate these silly drawings into my pottery. I can’t remember what compelled me to start using my own drawings, probably just a subtle yearning to find my own voice. My first attempts were bad, of course, but I kept at it; there were stubbed toes and skinned knees, but I kept at it, and now here I am.
Initial Approach
I generally use a brown or red mid-range stoneware, which I then cover in a white slip. I’ll use whatever commercially produced clay I can get my hands on. Porcelain is just too high maintenance for my laid-back demeanor. I need a clay body I can ignore for a day or two without being scolded. I realized how much I preferred a darker clay body when I made the Salad Days plates for the Watershed Center for the Ceramic Arts in 2016. I really like the layering that occurs when you brush slips on. This also allows for the utilization of the sgraffito technique, which has a similar feel to doodling on paper.
My pottery-making cycles tend to ebb and flow as needed, with upticks occurring as deadlines approach. My busiest times of the year are May/June and October. I’ve never been the type of potter who can make dozens of the same form over and over. I prefer to switch things up and keep it interesting.
I’ll confess that there are times when I become completely tired of making pottery. During these times, I turn to other creative endeavors, such as making plywood cutouts of creatures and finding fun places for them to exist. This activity started out as a lark, but now people are requesting that I come put a creature at their house. Do you want one at yours?
My pouring pots start with roughly 1 pound (0.5 kg) of clay (1) thrown as bottomless cylinders (2), then they are paddled into a squarish shape (3). After they set up a bit, I add a ¼-inch (6.3-mm) slab to the top and bottom. Then, I use a Mudtools’ shredder to further accentuate the squareishness (4). I add a spout and a short flange, both thrown off the hump, for the cork (5). The corks may or may not come from my favorite brand of mezcal. Who can say for sure?
My mugs are typically made from 1 pound (0.5 kg) of clay, although I do sometimes make smaller and jumbo ones as well. I like to have a variety of sizes to keep the surface treatment fresh and interesting to me. To make my handles, I start with a carrot-shaped coil, 3–4 in. (7.6–10.1 cm) long, depending on the size of the mug. I then flatten out the carrot with a printmaking brayer and bend it into an arch. When it has set up a bit, I attach it to the mug.
Layering and Mixing the Surface
When the pots are leather hard, apply layers of white slip (8). I brush on two coats, or the brush marks look streaky. The slip I use is a variation of a well-known slip recipe called Fish Sauce. I add 4–5% Zircopax to make it extra white. Once the slip is dry to the touch, I add decorative elements to the mug using a Diamond Core stylus to etch into the clay (9). Sometimes I’ll use underglaze to paint a black figure on the surface (10) with some sgraffito embellishments (11). Same as the slip, at least two coats of underglaze are required to not look streaky. Sometimes the entire pot will be decorated solely with sgraffito. Very little planning goes into these compositions. I work entirely intuitively. If I make a mistake, I pretend that’s what I wanted all along. The underglaze painting and sgraffito occur when the pot is about 80% dry. After the pot is bisque fired to cone 06, use a brush to paint the embellished areas with commercial glazes, such as the Amaco Celadon series or Satin Matte series (12). Commercial glazes aren’t cheap, but I like the fact that since someone else made them, I can spend that time making art or walking my dog or various other semi-productive endeavors.
I mix my own clear, which I use as a liner and also (a thinned-down version) on the exterior. If the exterior glaze is too thick, it becomes too shiny, which is not what you want. I’ve been using a clear that utilizes Custer feldspar, of which I’ve got about a year’s supply. When that’s gone, I’ll figure out something else.
What Do You Think the Story Is?
People sometimes remark on the narrative quality of my work, which is not actually what I’m going for. The imagery I incorporate into my pottery is based on a shared visual language many people find familiar or recognizable. I’m not going for anything specific, more of a vague association someone might have with a particular cartoon or advertising logo. I want my images to exist at a three-way intersection of strange, irregular, and implicit. As a rapidly fading Gen-Xer, I’ve got an archived compilation of images stored in my memory.
I’ll leave it up to the viewer to create their own associations. I looked it up, and there’s actually a term that comes close to defining what I do. It’s called “folk semiotics,” which sounds smart, so that’s what I’m going with.
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The audio file for this article was produced by the Ceramic Arts Network staff and not read by the author.
I woke up one day and realized I’d been at this pottery thing for 30 years. It’s been a meandering path from there to here, “there” being the ceramics studio at the University of Wyoming and “here” being my semi-attached garage studio in Spruce Pine, North Carolina. I wasn’t an art major in college. I spent most of my twenties without direction or purpose. I took my first pottery class almost as an afterthought while pursuing a degree in elementary education. As is often the case with potters, I was immediately hooked. Aside from some intro-level classes at the University of Wyoming, I never really received any formal pottery training. I mostly just picked it up by sitting at the wheel and teaching myself. I started out as a porcelain guy—porcelain with flashing slips in wood kilns, soda kilns, or wood/soda/salt kilns. My early mentors were wood firers, people like Jeff Shapiro, Mary Roehm, and Josh DeWeese (from afar), who were celestial bodies I found myself orbiting around. I think I was mostly attracted to the process of atmospheric firings more than the actual results, but it took me a few years to come to this realization.
I did a post-bac year at Nova Scotia College of Arts and Design (NSCAD) in Halifax. Walter Ostrom once quipped that I had 50 words for brown (He’s very quippy). At NSCAD, I started doodling on my pots, mostly with slips and oxides. Still using porcelain with flashing slips, I was mostly just riffing on Kenzan, Oribe, and Tz’u-chou ware. I had always been a doodler and had sketchbooks filled with drawings of strange people and animals. It never crossed my mind that I could actually incorporate these silly drawings into my pottery. I can’t remember what compelled me to start using my own drawings, probably just a subtle yearning to find my own voice. My first attempts were bad, of course, but I kept at it; there were stubbed toes and skinned knees, but I kept at it, and now here I am.
Initial Approach
I generally use a brown or red mid-range stoneware, which I then cover in a white slip. I’ll use whatever commercially produced clay I can get my hands on. Porcelain is just too high maintenance for my laid-back demeanor. I need a clay body I can ignore for a day or two without being scolded. I realized how much I preferred a darker clay body when I made the Salad Days plates for the Watershed Center for the Ceramic Arts in 2016. I really like the layering that occurs when you brush slips on. This also allows for the utilization of the sgraffito technique, which has a similar feel to doodling on paper.
My pottery-making cycles tend to ebb and flow as needed, with upticks occurring as deadlines approach. My busiest times of the year are May/June and October. I’ve never been the type of potter who can make dozens of the same form over and over. I prefer to switch things up and keep it interesting.
I’ll confess that there are times when I become completely tired of making pottery. During these times, I turn to other creative endeavors, such as making plywood cutouts of creatures and finding fun places for them to exist. This activity started out as a lark, but now people are requesting that I come put a creature at their house. Do you want one at yours?
My pouring pots start with roughly 1 pound (0.5 kg) of clay (1) thrown as bottomless cylinders (2), then they are paddled into a squarish shape (3). After they set up a bit, I add a ¼-inch (6.3-mm) slab to the top and bottom. Then, I use a Mudtools’ shredder to further accentuate the squareishness (4). I add a spout and a short flange, both thrown off the hump, for the cork (5). The corks may or may not come from my favorite brand of mezcal. Who can say for sure?
My mugs are typically made from 1 pound (0.5 kg) of clay, although I do sometimes make smaller and jumbo ones as well. I like to have a variety of sizes to keep the surface treatment fresh and interesting to me. To make my handles, I start with a carrot-shaped coil, 3–4 in. (7.6–10.1 cm) long, depending on the size of the mug. I then flatten out the carrot with a printmaking brayer and bend it into an arch. When it has set up a bit, I attach it to the mug.
Layering and Mixing the Surface
When the pots are leather hard, apply layers of white slip (8). I brush on two coats, or the brush marks look streaky. The slip I use is a variation of a well-known slip recipe called Fish Sauce. I add 4–5% Zircopax to make it extra white. Once the slip is dry to the touch, I add decorative elements to the mug using a Diamond Core stylus to etch into the clay (9). Sometimes I’ll use underglaze to paint a black figure on the surface (10) with some sgraffito embellishments (11). Same as the slip, at least two coats of underglaze are required to not look streaky. Sometimes the entire pot will be decorated solely with sgraffito. Very little planning goes into these compositions. I work entirely intuitively. If I make a mistake, I pretend that’s what I wanted all along. The underglaze painting and sgraffito occur when the pot is about 80% dry. After the pot is bisque fired to cone 06, use a brush to paint the embellished areas with commercial glazes, such as the Amaco Celadon series or Satin Matte series (12). Commercial glazes aren’t cheap, but I like the fact that since someone else made them, I can spend that time making art or walking my dog or various other semi-productive endeavors.
I mix my own clear, which I use as a liner and also (a thinned-down version) on the exterior. If the exterior glaze is too thick, it becomes too shiny, which is not what you want. I’ve been using a clear that utilizes Custer feldspar, of which I’ve got about a year’s supply. When that’s gone, I’ll figure out something else.
What Do You Think the Story Is?
People sometimes remark on the narrative quality of my work, which is not actually what I’m going for. The imagery I incorporate into my pottery is based on a shared visual language many people find familiar or recognizable. I’m not going for anything specific, more of a vague association someone might have with a particular cartoon or advertising logo. I want my images to exist at a three-way intersection of strange, irregular, and implicit. As a rapidly fading Gen-Xer, I’ve got an archived compilation of images stored in my memory.
I’ll leave it up to the viewer to create their own associations. I looked it up, and there’s actually a term that comes close to defining what I do. It’s called “folk semiotics,” which sounds smart, so that’s what I’m going with.
To learn more about Kurt Anderson and his work, visit www.kurtandersonpottery.com or follow on Instagram @kurtandersonpottery.
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