Gary Jackson: Fire When Ready Pottery
A Chicago potter’s somewhat slanted view of clay & play
Categories: summer camp

Another day in Chess Camp… and it’s all starting to come together!
One square at a time!

Categories: bike, sunrise

Another quiet ride with some low-hanging haze along the horizon delaying the sunrise just a bit. Rippled reflections with an ombre’-shaded sunrise.

Categories: bike, sunrise

With just a low-flying layer of clouds on the horizon, it was a chilly start to the morning today. Quiet & serene… but I kinda wish I had added some long sleeves for my morning ride?! HA!

Categories: flowers, soda-fired, stamped, vases

After a trip to the Andersonville Farmer’s Market on Wednesday, this collection of beautiful dahlias is now looking quite comfortable in one of my stamped & soda-fired oval vases. Beautiful blooms from Vangie’s Farm… including crazy cool & crazy huge curly burgundy dahlia! Perfect for a beautiful Floral Friday!

Categories: process, summer camp, surface decoration, textures, tools

After a quick summer camp demo, Colette took on a fun carving texture challenge… using one of my favorite DiamondCore Tools! Even the older kids appreciate using nicer tools for finer line carvings. And Colette rocked it!!!

Categories: summer camp, wheelthrowing

Just finished another week of Wheelthrowing Summer Camp… and they cranked out a ton of cool pieces this week! All trimmed & decorated with colored slips. Now just waiting to be bisqued, clear glazed & fired again. Not too shabby for a bunch of 10-11 year olds, right?!

Categories: classes, clay, summer camp

I came into my summer camp room to find that some adult student from last night left us a little “present” in the splash pan of one of the wheels! And yet somehow the kids always get blamed for leaving a mess? They don’t even use that kind of clay!!!

Plus, I have confidence… and I would easily bank on my summer campers cleaning better than most!!! They’re great when it comes to clean-up. I just wish everyone followed Gary’s Summer Camp Rule #3… “Whatever mess you make, you WILL be cleaning up!” Adults included…

Categories: bike, sunrise

The waves are still acting up, while the sunrise was dappled through some low-flying clouds. Another beautiful morning with cool temps & chilled breezes.

Categories: mugs, production, stamped

So here they are for now… lots of new mugs with some of them “destined” to be part of our class trading & exchanging game for the final night of my Intermediate Wheel class. Still gotta lot to do… drying, bisque firing, glazing & firing again… with the deadline quickly approaching… giddy-up!

Categories: summer camp

We also had another birthday in camp today! So of course we needed a birthday cake… and two campers jumped right in!!! Aaron threw the cake on the wheel… and then Ophelia decorated it. So cute!!! Birthday boy Colin was very pleased with his first-ever clay birthday cake!!!