Little Brown Jug

In the Fall 2024, The Art Center of Capital Region in Troy, NY will host an exhibition titled, Dig Deeper: [some] Art, Science and History of Troy Clay which features work and research of a group of artists using local clays. The exhibit will include a range of programming created for both professional and recreational audiences.

Residing within the larger exhibition is the Little Brown Jug show. For over 150 years, Albany Slip was one of the most important materials in colonial American ceramics, and the little brown jug bearing this glaze was ubiquitous. The last mine where it was manufactured closed for good in the 1980's, but geologically, the material was still there. We found a cousin material in the nearby town of Schaghticoke. Having gotten permission from the town to share some with you, Broken Mold Studio and friends invite you to join us in experimenting and creating work for this exhibition. We want to learn more about clays in the landscape; to learn more about the history of pottery in New York State's Capital District and Upper Hudson Region, both during and before the colonial era; to test materials and share glaze chemistry and firing results; and to consider artists' responsibility for extractive practice. The Little Brown Jug show invites ceramists to submit in the categories of historic form, contemporary form, miniature or glaze kitchen.

Jurors Mary Barringer, potter and former editor of Studio Potter magazine, and Dr. Jennifer Lemak, Chief Curator of the New York State Museum, will select some of the exhibited pots to travel (post-exhibition) to the Museum and be displayed alongside their historic counterparts in the Weitsman Collection.

Join us!

Phase 1: 9/1/23- 5/1/24. Request for Material.

Phase 2: 4/7-7/31/24. Upload Finished Work Images and Details to the Call for Entry. (Let us know if you need another couple of days... message @schaghticoke_slip )

Follow on Instagram at @schaghticoke_slip and tag us or collaborate to share your results and join the conversation!

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The Little Brown Jug project and archive reside at the Broken Mold Studio, a community pottery in Troy, NY. The studio claims its place in a long line of historic Troy potteries, possibly dating back to 1799 and Branch Green who may have been the first documented potter working in the city, at least of the colonial era. Broken Mold is the steward of a small clay deposit that yields a close relative of (commercially unavailable) Albany Slip. Broken Mold does not seek to make this material commercially available, but would like to share some material and what we are learning about it with you. Follow on Instagram at @schaghticoke_slip to learn more, request material, and to tag to share your results!

L I T T L E B R O W N J U G

CALL FOR ENTRIES

For over 150 years, Albany Slip was one of the most important materials in American ceramics. Discovered in two locations in Albany NY, it was a staple ingredient in 19 c. potteries, and then in industrial ceramics (think dark brown electrical insulators), college ceramics departments and studio potteries across the country. Its defining property was the ability to form a glossy black-brown glaze at stoneware temperatures, sometimes even without additional fluxes. This made it the go-to liner glaze for the thousands of jugs, crocks, flasks, water coolers, and cooking pots made during the 19th century, and the main ingredient of countless Asian-style tenmoku glazes developed during the studio pottery boom of the 1970s and 80s.

Sadly for potters, Albany Slip ceased to be mined in the late 1980’s, owing to a combination of costly safety requirements and development pressures in the Capital region, and the site was paved for a parking lot. Talk about supply-chain bummers! Potters have stockpiled their dwindling supplies, searched for substitutions, and/or moved on.

BUT!

In 2021, searching in the Troy area for Hudson River brick clay, NRCS soil scientists Olga Vargas and Steve Carlisle, with ceramic artist Margaret Boozer, identified material in North Troy/ Schaghticoke which later turned out to be very similar to Albany Slip. Boozer connected with Troy ceramic artists Bianca Dupuis of the Broken Mold Studio and Robilee McIntyre, we asked permission from the town of Schaghticoke, and together we hatched the plan to share this material and what we are learning about it through an exhibit with programming and online resources. The online presence is an Instagram page at @schaghticoke_slip where we can all tag and share our results.

LITTLE

These works will be on shelves on the wall, so little is good! Work should weigh no more than 5lbs and fit within a 6" x 6" x 12" area. (Though if you have an idea for a pot that doesn't fit within these parameters, ask. If we can accommodate, we will.)

BROWN

This Schaghticoke Slip clay, like the original Albany Slip, is most suitable for glazes. On its own, it is a cone 10 reduction glaze, ranging from burnt to raw umber to a range of tenmokus. It looks great in wood, salt and soda firings as well. Schaghticoke Slip is a geologically deposited material, so there is variation from batch to batch, depending on dig location. Broken Mold Troy processed and homogenized 300 lbs so we can compare results and have some predictable replication. Our glaze wizard Ryan Rahkshan has been experimenting with some Cone 6 oxidation recipes to share.

JUG

Or dish or urn or arm flask or water cooler or sculpture or bottle or totem or temperance jug or foot warmer or... When you apply, select a category for participation: historic form, contemporary form, miniature or glaze kitchen. Want to look at some Albany Slip glazed pots? Chief Curator of History Dr. Jennifer Lemak invites you to visit The New York State Museum in Albany where you can see historic examples of Albany slip glazed stoneware in the Adam Weitsman Collection. Good examples of Albany slip ware can also be found the Hart-Cluett Museum in Troy, and countless other museums with early American pottery collections all across the country.

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Join us!

Phase 1: 9/1/23- 5/1/24. Request for Material.

Phase 2: 4/7-7/31/24. Upload Finished Work Images and Details to the Call for Entry.

Follow on Instagram at @schaghticoke_slip and tag us to share your results and join the conversation!

Calendar

Sept 1, 2023- May 1, 2024: Phase 1: Request for Material. We'll honor requests up to May 1 and even after until we run out out of our stash of dug + homogenized Schaghticoke Slip material.

April 7 - July 31, 2024: Phase 2, Call for Entry submissions due by midnight July 31, 2024. (BUT let us know if you need another couple of days.)

August 1-2, 2024: Notification of accepted Little Brown Jug works, by email and posted to IG @schaghticoke_slip

Aug 10, 2024: POSTMARK DATE for shipping. Accepted entries postmarked by August 10, 2024, shipped to to The Arts Center of the Capital Region , with details in email acceptance. (Please try to ship/ postmark by AUGUST 10!! - we adjusted the calendar but realized we accidentally left up some old dates here... if you were planning to postmark by 8/20, please let us know, email margaret@margaretboozer.com, title SHIPPING LITTLE BROWN JUG or message at @schaghticoke_slip)

Aug 16-20, 2024: HAND DELIVERY dates. Hand delivered work may be received at The Arts Center of the Capital Region , with details in email acceptance.

All accepted and received work will be displayed in the Little Brown Jug show as part of the larger exhibit, Dig Deeper: [some] Art, Science and History of Troy Clay, running September 27-November 16, 2024 at The Art Center of the Capital Region.

September 27, 2024: Opening day for Dig Deeper: [some] Art, Science and History of Troy Clay including Little Brown Jug

November 16, 2024: Exhibition closes.

Nov. 17 -Dec 1, 2024: Work returned to artists, unless it's been selected to move to the NY State Museum in Albany. After the exhibit, a small group of these pots selected by the jurors will travel to the NY State Museum in Albany to be displayed alongside their historic forbears in New York State Museum’s Adam Weitsman Stoneware Collection.

Jurors

Mary Barringer:
Potter, writer, former editor Studio Potter Magazine

Dr. Jennifer Lemak:
Chief Curator of History NY State Museum

Mary Barringer received a BA in art from Bennington College, apprenticed with Michael Frimkess, and has been a studio artist since 1973, making both sculpture and functional pottery. She has exhibited widely and taught at universities, art schools, and craft centers. In addition to her studio work, she has written and lectured on the history of ceramics, and from 2004 until 2014 she served as editor of The Studio Potter. She lives and works in western Massachusetts and serves on the board of Craigardan in upstate New York.

Jennifer Lemak is the chief curator of history at the New York State Museum. Prior to this appointment, she served there as senior historian/curator of social history. She loves sharing the artifacts in the Museum's collections with the public, especially the Weitsman Stoneware Collection. Lemak serves the history field as a member of the New York State Preservation Board and as co-editor of the New York History journal. She earned her MA in Public History and Ph.D. in American History, both from the University at Albany.

Project Organizers

Margaret Boozer/ Urban Soils Institute
Ryan Rahkshan / Midnight Ceramics
Bianca Depuis/ Broken Mold Studio
Robilee McIntyre/ FuzzyLightbulb Studio + Troy Bricks

Partners

The Broken Mold Studio

Art Center of the Capital Region

NYC Urban Soils Institute

New York State Museum
+ The Weitsman Collection

USDA/ NRCS

Ryan Rahkshan
+ Midnight Ceramics

Resources

Ryan Rakhshan's glaze testing results and info using Schaghticoke Slip

Wild Clay: Creating ceramics and glazes from natural and found resources

by Matt Levy, Takuro Shibata and Hitomi Shibata

Soil Web,
UC Davis

Pottery Works: Potteries of New York State's Capital District and Upper Hudson Region, by Warren F. Broderick and William Bouck

Glazy.org

Jeff Zamek,
Albany Slip consultant

Img 44: Clay exposure along River Rd., across from Lock No. 1, Champlain Canal, Lansingburgh, NY. I just scraped a little away at the base of the clay scarp. Mapped Hudson. Varved clays (thinly bedded sediments representing low energy, low volume sediments from winter alternating with high energy sedimentation from spring, summer, fall). I am uncertain as to the meaning of the gray layer, but I suspect it might be a little tighter.

"As Tom Sanford [Rensselaer County Soil and Water Conservation District] indicated in our virtual meeting, the clays are lacustrine deposits from Lake Albany. When high energy streams and meltwaters disgorged into the streams rapidly dissipating energy could no longer carry larger particles and they dropped out of suspension. Hence the gravel and sand deposits around Sand Lake, Averill Park and Wynantskill. Further out in Lake Albany where there was little energy to keep particles suspended the colloidal particles (clays) gradually wafted down to the lake bed. Surges in stream energy, summer versus winter, explain the layers or varves seen in the image where I scraped off some of the slough on the one photo. Lake Albany was dammed by the Harbor Hill Moraine which stretched from Staten Island to Brooklyn and Queens. When that moraine was breached Lake Albany drained, possibly in a cataclysmic fashion, and in its wake left the Hudson River and the narrows separating Staten Island from Queens."

-Steve Carlisle, retired soil scientist USDA-NRCS, 5/17/2021

From Jeff Zamek
Info on Albany Slip

No More Albany Slip -

The depleted stockpiles of Albany slip clay are an unfortunate event, but in many ways it was predictable in the history of raw materials used by potters. There are still geologic deposits of Albany slip clay, but it is no longer mined. Looking through any ceramics book or magazine reveals many glaze and clay body formulas that contain the low fire, high iron content slip clay. Many potters’ glaze notebooks will show one or more Albany Slip glaze formulas.

Locations of Albany Slip Clay -

Albany slip clay is an alluvial deposit formed by the transportation of material by glacial action in the Albany Hudson River region of New York State. Records indicate that two mine sites operated at different times. One was located near Livingston Avenue and North Lake Avenue beside Highway 1-90 in the city of Albany NY, on the edge of residential housing and industrial areas. Landfill from the Empire State Plaza project is now deposited throughout the site. The other mine was located off of North Lake Avenue, adjacent to the Tivoli Lake wildlife preserve.

At the site the over burden was stripped away, yielding four beds of clay that tested for uniform properties suitable for removal. The beds of clay were of variable thickness, with two layers measuring 8 ft. thick of select clay separated by sandy layers. The two beds of clay mined were similar to deposits under the Empire State Plaza in the center of the city.

Short History of Albany Slip Clay-

Albany slip clay has a complex mineralogy with high levels of alkalis and irons. This hydrous alumino-silicate clay is dark brown and non-plastic, having a silty texture. Potters used this once common but now scarce clay for over 250 years. The northern Hudson Valley of New York State was an active pottery-making region; by the 1840’s almost sixty potters produced ware in and around the city of Albany. The records of Albany slip clay, commonly called “Albany mud”, date back to the Revolutionary war period.

At higher temperature ranges, above c/9 (23000 F.), Albany slip clay is almost a glaze by itself and is characterized by a glossy flowing surface ranging in color from light yellow/green to dark brown/black in reduction kiln atmospheres. Due to its high iron content Albany slip was used in “Temmoku” iron crystal glazes, producing a wide range of effects such as “hare’s fur” (light streaks in the glaze), to “tea dust” (small crystals formed in the glaze upon cooling). .

The last stockpile of Hammill & Gillespie’s Albany slip clay was depleted in 1987. The clay was shipped in 50 lb. brown bags with black side lettering, and some bags were not marked with production lot numbers. The subsequent variations in chemical analysis of the slip and the variation in kiln firing atmospheres, clay bodies and glaze application methods can account for the variations in the fired glaze. Remember, just because the name on the bag stays the same what’s inside may not be the same.

Albany Slip Substitutions -

Due to its unique natural mineral content, which changed at various times in its availability, Albany slip clay has proven somewhat difficult to reproduce either by using other slip clays or building a substitute by duplicating its oxide content. As with other naturally occurring ores such as Gerstley borate and Barnard slip clay there are no definitive chemical analyses of the materials to use as a baseline when considering a substitution. Additionally, trace materials found in the deposit can contribute to unique firing qualities that often do not lend themselves to duplication. In the past, Michigan slip clay was an acceptable substitute for Albany, but it was discontinued in the 1970s.

When a raw material is no longer available and potters exhaust their own supply there is always a rush to find adequate substitutes. Unfortunately, many raw materials are unique in chemical composition, trace elements, particle size distribution, handling characteristics and organic content and do not lend themselves to a one-to-one substitution suitable for every temperature range and kiln atmosphere. In the past, ceramics supply companies have hurried to sell substitutes, which sometimes did not yield the desired results. Potters have often stockpiled reserves of the original raw material which can tie up money and studio storage space. Sadly, this story does not seem to have a happy ending for most potters.