Little bowls and vases have been a real joy for me to throw lately! Possibly because of the fact that my throwing has improved over the last few months. They are a nice and quick little bit of joy, not too hard, not too simple.
Im using about 100 or so grams of mid-fire clay, giving it a good knead beforehand to make sure there is no imperfections and to soften the clay up a little bit.
One thing I have noticed with clay cut straight from the slab is its very easy to get a little air pocket trapped when forming it into a ball for throwing, a good 20-30 kneads does the trick generally.
After kneading, I throw it on the wheel head and begin to cone and centre, this process takes about 5 or so minutes to do, doing about 4 or so to make sure the clay is nice and consistent, plus I find if the clay is a little too, hard this process softens it up
Then after creating a small indentation in the middle of the clay, I brought the walls up in one continuous motion. This was something I didn’t learn overnight, it takes a lot of practise and patience. But that doesn’t mean its not something that you cannot do without a little time spent in front of the wheel head
Spending a few hours or so during the course of the week makes all the difference, get to know how the clay responds to input, how it feels in the hand, when its getting too soft or wet, when its too dry or firm. These are all things that you begin to understand when you start spending more time on the wheel.
So get out there and have fun!
It was also a partially nice day too so the lighting was good for the camera and I got a nice video out of it
hope you enjoyed this throw and your own pottery projects are going well, even if this is your first time seeing some clay, maybe this a sign to start! 👀
We have some awesome pieces of pottery to show you tomorrow in our next reel so keep a lookout for that!!
Until next time! and Happy Potting ☺️
