Legs and Arms Everywhere

This coil built pot is made on 2 banding wheels in two tiers. The coiling process begins as 2 cylinders, which are rolled out coils layed on top of each other and joined with the scoring and slipping process.

In my teaching practice we say:

‘You score it to grip it and you slip it to stick it!’

 With hands working together on the inside and outside of the pot, similar to throwing, the shape is stretched out and refined with a bamboo rib, sometimes a metal serrated edged kidney and various rubber kidneys. Sometimes air bubbles occur during this process and I open them up and smooth out the clay. This process takes a long time and also includes periods of drying and rest time for the clay. I absolutely love the way I get lost in the process and learn about every square centimetre of the clay. I have never timed this process as if I did I would need to charge millions of pounds for my pots!

 The two shapes are made to match in the circumference of the joining edges. To do this I use callipers to get the exact measurements. My tools bring me great joy, especially my callipers as they were made by me in the silversmith department in our weekly tool making classes when I was at Camberwell School of Art and Craft at the beginning of the 1980s. I have quite a few tools from that period including my large banding wheel.

Joining sections like this was a technique I learned when throwing. Coiling is like a very slow way of throwing. It suits me and helps me to centre myself.

I first learned the joys of coiling at Brockenhurst sixth form College when I discovered that I could do Ceramics as an A Level and I had the greatest and most enthusiastic teacher in the world, Colin Jones. 

Over the years as a school pottery teacher, we occasionally made pots using the coiling process, but I found myself offering to help too much. The children would need to remind me whose pot it was!

I digress. Back to Legs and Arms Everywhere. I love to draw. I draw from life to improve my skills, to look deeper and understand, and also from my imagination. I have always daydreamed of running around, running away and dancing. I suppose this has been because for me it's the way I unravel tangled thoughts. 

My sister Jo gave me a book on Arthur Rackham when I was in my teens and I copied every figure hoping to be able to draw with flow and capture characters. I also copied my Dad drawing cartoons to become or appear to be confident. I tried to copy Jo’s fashion drawings, not too well but worked with the family love of clothes and characters. These figures float around my pots to this day.

I draw with a potter's needle as if it were a black fine-liner on paper. In this faze my pottery door is closed and I am totally focused. It doesn't take as long as the coiling process but it is very intense. 

I then paint in some slip in about 3-4 layers, allowing the layers to dry until not shiny in between. Having my studio at home means I can pop in and out adding layers. At this stage I am also tweaking my drawn line if it gets lost under slip.

As in a cartoon, I exaggerate the lengths of limbs to get the feeling of stretch. The hands and feet take a figure beyond. I enjoy working with shapes and patterns of a vessel and how the stories go all around a pot and take the viewer with them like in ancient Greek Attic Ware.

 In a graphic way I try to create energetic patterns and  spaces between images.

The pot is biscuit fired to 1000 degrees. I complete my pot by running copper oxide through the indented lines and using coloured stoneware glazes. I like to use different types of glazes to get matt and shiny surfaces and different types of colours. The final firing is up to 1240 degrees which makes my pots frost proof.

This pot brings together so much of everything I love.