Gary Jackson: Fire When Ready Pottery
A Chicago potter’s somewhat slanted view of clay & play
Categories: collaborations, porcelain, process, production, stamped

Painting some accents & details onto my lidded jars with colored flashing slips. These lidded jars will all be soda-fired… so hopefully the porcelain will get a beautiful blushed effect & the colored flashing slips will pop with color! Working my way towards ART IN THE GARDEN with a few of our special collaboration pieces!!!

Categories: collaborations, porcelain, process, production

Lidded jars without knobs… whoops… but, part of the plan!!! Working on these lidded jars as part of my collaboration pieces for ART IN THE GARDEN. Drilling holes through leatherhard porcelain?… why not use an actual drill bit???

Categories: collaborations, porcelain, process, production, stamped

YEAH!!! The lids all fit… as you can now hear me exhale!

Throwing lidded jars in porcelain with lids that fit is not an easy task. A lot of caliper measuring & hoping for the best. My biggest piece of advice?… throw a lot of extra lids. Because inevitably a “few” of them are not going to fit the way you want them too!

Categories: collaborations, porcelain, pottery, process, production, stamped

Part two of my production today… the bottom jars to go with the new lids!!! The jar bottoms are a little further ahead as I just finished stamping them! Just hope the lids fit?… always said with fingers crossed.

Categories: collaborations, porcelain, process, production, studio

So now I’m focused on my parts of the collaboration projects we have planned for ART IN THE GARDEN. Right now I’m making lids… can’t totally tell you why quite yet… but that’s part of the fun of our collaborations…

TEASERS!!!

Categories: mugs, process, production

Ten cylinders now have handles… making that ten fresh new mugs!!!
These are the same ones from my Tuesday night class challenge with Ashley… finished just in time for my Saturday morning class… with minutes to spare…

Categories: mugs, process, production

Gonna try to crank out some quick mug handles before class starts at 10:00am this morning! Pulling them is easy… it’s the attaching that takes forever… but who doesn’t like a good challenge???

Categories: pottery, process, production, studio, tools
Categories: process, production, stamped, stamps, textures

While I was at it tonight… I also stamped a larger flower pot… which was my “demo-on-demand” demo request Tuesday night before we did the bowls!!! Thanks Christy!

Categories: clay, porcelain, process

Gotta keep things moving along… pulling out another large batch of porcelain reclaim clay in the studio tonight. I let the clay pieces, trimmings & chunks dry completely before breaking them down. And then it’s all been soaking & slaking down for quite awhile. Enough of the water has evaporated that I could pull it all out of my reclaim bin and set it up on a large plaster bat. It will sit there for a few days while the excess water seeps into the plaster bat and the clay stiffens up… and then the real wedging begins!