Sustained Investigation #1

Essential Question: How can I demonstrate the beauty of native flowers through a thrown form? 

Ideas: For this piece, I wanted to be inspired by flowers. I looked at Japanese ceramics for inspiration and saw cups that I liked. I also wanted to be inspired by a native flower, so I chose the New England Aster. 

Materials: Clay, Underglaze, Cone-5 Glaze

Processes: I threw the cups and then carved out the flowers when it was leather-hard. I bisque fired it, and then stained the flower with purple underglaze before going over that with cone-5 glaze. 

Reflection on Work

I started out wanting to make a plate inspired by Japanese pottery from the 16th-18th centuries. However, the bats I was using were not working and I couldn’t center the clay on them. So I switched to making a cup, which was another form I saw in my research of Japanese pottery. I wanted to incorporate flowers that are native to Maine into my piece, so I chose the New England Aster to incorporate into my design. Asters are wildflowers, so I chose to scatter them randomly across the cup’s surface. 

I wanted to learn how to throw a plate, but when that didn’t work, I revised my plan to throw a cup. I experimented with carving techniques and ended up with flowers that appeared slightly lifted off of the cup. I had to think about how I wanted to fill the space with the flowers, and how I wanted to make them the focal point. 

This piece led me to deepen my essential question to flowers that have specific meaning to me and to look at ceramics in history for inspiration. I want to involve a flower that has personal meaning to me in my next piece, as well as explore another culture’s style of pottery.