Rain, kiln unloaded and potluck supper

Water, water everywhere..!  The road to the States and the one East to Saskatchewan were closed due to flooding. It's so cool and rainy that the salt kiln cooled much more quickly than last time. Claude had to leave to attend a sale in Regina on Saturday but was able to unload the kiln around noon. Lovely results! I only had 6 new pots in this firing and a couple of refires, but there's so much information to help with the spraying and glazing of the pots for the last salt just before the month is up.  pics tomorrow..

Wedged together a bag of H550 and a bag of H570. I hope this will give me the iron of the first to encourage orange peel and the bright white and throwability of the second. Threw parts for a rooster and 4 other jugbirds. I'll have fun assembling those tomorrow.

Spent some time with my mask and work gloves cleaning melted glass from the sides and undersides of the shelves. Aaron rebuilt the bag wall ready for Jim Etzkorn to load and fire a salt firing tomorrow.

Frustrated with not being able to get to the stores or home I looked into a rental car. After a phone call to my home car insurance company I can now rent without having to pay extra insurance - I hope. Another frustration is the fact that the electricity is to be turned off in our flat for annual maintenance tomorrow. With luck it'll be on again by the evening but if not, it'd be nice to go out for supper.

There was a party hosted by Rose and Sandi after work today. We had burgers, salmon, pork and all manner of vegs, snacks and desserts. So nice. Thanks. Good to get to know the families of Aaron, Robin and Quentin. Teresa gave Brenda, Leigh and me a ride back to the flat. Tomorrow - independence!

IXL Brickworks visit

We were at the Shaw Centre at 8.40am to go on a tour of the IXL Brickworks. Terrible rainy, windy weather. But seeing the manufacture of bricks was really interesting for a potter. The business has been there since the 1800s, first using clay from the local hillside but now trucked in from East End and Redcliffe. We saw enormous extruders, tunnel kilns, brick presses and so many different colours of bricks. Beautiful!

I was given a white brick just cooling from the kiln. It will go in my garden.

During the afternoon Fraser Valley potter Lucille Webster and her husband Alan visited the studio after checking out the Medalta site. They'd made a day trip from Calgary where they're holidaying with family. Nice to see people from home.

There was a meeting of Residents to sort out which kilns will be fired when over the potentially very busy next week and a half. With luck and serious cooperation everybody's wants for suitable space in their chosen kilns will be achieved.

2nd salt firing, June 16th.

Yesterday was taken up with firing the salt kiln again. We lit it at 7.30am.

Claude took Leigh and me to Ackland Grainger to buy proper vapour masks. I was able to buy North ones that fit my mask. I can still use the regular filters when I'm mixing glaze.

In the afternoon the media came to meet us and interview some for a local TV station. All good pr for Medalta and the Residency Programme. Handles on tankards and trimmed a plate. We organized another salt burrito-making stint. Jenn popped out to the Wholesale Food Suppliers just next door to buy 2 large sacks of Sifto salt. There are now lots of burritos ready for today's and next week's firings. There will be several - some light, and one more 'heavy' salt.Claude, Jin and I are happy to have finished that job!

Salting went on for a couple of hours. We added 24 lbs in 2 lb saltings. I quickly realized that the draw-rings I'd made for this firing were of H570 clay, not the H550 of last time. There is much less orange peel. We simply added salt until we felt there was a good melt. Peeking in (with a flash light) next day it looks as if there's orange peel on some. Interestingly the left hand bag wall slumped into the left side. It became impossible to insert salt that side - slippery glazed bricks in the way..  Let's hope the salt was nicely distributed anyway.

Medalta Clay Industries visit

10am we were taken on a guided tour of the Medalta National Historic District. Ron Mason, the education coordinator, was a very knowledgeable and animated guide. In the photo he's explaining slip casting. Chelsea Scott is cleaning up jiggered bowls.

Here we are pretending to be Medalta Pottery workers.

The interpretive displays are just great. They give a good feeling for the pottery of the time, from the very lucrative sewer pipe business to the commemorative dishes, kitchen ware and crocks to some entirely awful tourist items. We could imagine that working conditions in the forties were fairly dreadful as we were taken through parts of the old factory.

This is a grog-grinder. Imagine the noise!

Brenda, Sara, me and Robin at Plainsman Clay.

Back at the studio Claude had the salt kiln completely loaded. Tomorrow I must set my alarm for 6.30am as we hope to turn the kiln on by 7.30am. Burritos to make, a trip to the safety mask supplier and the media are visiting. When to work?

I trimmed 3 large tankards, painted some slips on birds and we took a quick trip to buy groceries. Half way through the Residency!

Sorry the text doesn't line up perfectly with the photos.

visitors from Lethbridge June 14

Claude has booked the salt kiln for Wednesday so I wadded my few pots and the draw-rings for that. I'll refire one or two from the first firing. We plan to do slightly less reduction.

Les Manning's Aesthetic contribution.

My new screen saver is this pile of sewer pipes behind the Medalta complex.

Inspired by Rosemary Cochrane's 'Salt-Glaze Ceramics',  I threw some tankards and vases with more decoration in mind.

At 7pm more Residents' Presentations were scheduled. Earlier a group from the Oldman River Potters Guild in Lethbridge arrived for that. I was delighted to see Elaine Harrison again. She and the guild were so welcoming to me when I was in Lethbridge for the opening of 'The Attic Project' with Eric Metcalfe some 10 years ago. Elaine is a member and past-president of ORPG and for the next 2 years is president of the Alberta Potters. Presenters this evening were Brenda Sullivan, Luann Johnson, Candice Ring, Rose Bauer, Teresa Gagne, Joanne Zabudsky, Sandra Mander and Sara Lynch. I hope to add a photo of each of these Residents with their work later in June.

Sunday at the studio

A really lovely hot day - and I didn't get outside to enjoy it!

Finished applying handles to mugs. I threw and assembled a fairly large bird bowl and two silly little birds. They'll be useful to test contrasting slips in salt. Potter Nicole Reidmueller paid us a visit with her children Willow and Silas.

Jim Etzkorn had a gallery opening for his work at the Community Centre in the afternoon. Salt and soda-fired work. Lovely. He is an artist in residence for the year and is working just near me. Again, most residents worked into the night. Not me.

Robin Dupont shovelling soda into his kiln.

Saturday

On Saturday I spent quite a while noting what slips did what on all my work. There are some super colours - and there are some that have a bit too much reduction. The one pot made of H570 looks great with Blair's Red slip - NS, grolleg & Helmer. I won't use H550 any more. I hope I don't regret that.   Handles on mugs..

Sprayed flashing slips on 4 pieces to have a first experience at cone 10 soda firing in Robin Dupont's firing tomorrow. When I had pots in the Shadbolt soda kiln I was hoping for totally salt effects and was disappointed - not consistent orange peel. Here I will see what else soda has to offer. I lined the pots with Janet De Boos' 'clear'. I'm told it will be pale sky blue, with luck..

Also sprayed 6 pieces including my 1/2-pipe jug with slips to bisque for Claude's salt firing next Wednesday. All pots for both atmospheric firings have a swoosh of titanium dioxide sprayed a la Jane Hamlyn. Over blue slip it produces marvellous green and over others it's orangey-yellow rutile look. Lovely!

Sobi Thai supper - $10 each. Excellent!    Others went to the Chuckwagon races. Not my scene. Once saw them at High River. Once is enough for this BC-er.

Back there my sons are celebrating Steve's BCIT Engineering degree completion with mountain bike races in the Chines above our Port Moody house.

photos of salted pots

Here are some more photos of the salted pots.

There was a party in the studio on Friday evening.

Finally opened the kiln on Friday

At 10am on Friday there was a scheduled tour of the old Hycroft Pottery factory which operated in competition with Medalta from the thirties until the sixties. It is full of amazing machinery and a vast circular kiln all slowly rotting away. For some years the building was used as the home of the Ceramic Residency programme as it started out. We are SO lucky to be working in the brand new facility next to the Medalta museum complex.While I waited for the kiln again I threw some mugs and bowls to fill spaces in the next salt kiln.

Finally in the late afternoon Aaron deemed the kiln cool enough! 

Sadly it is now 10pm Sunday night and the college security guy will come and turf me out. Internet doesn't work well at the studio so I plan to just write in the evenings. That way I can avoid carrying my MacBook each day and perhaps walk more. We've been lucky with rides from other artists mostly, taxi shared when not. We had a few seriously rainy and cold days but this weekend has been superbly sunny.

more pics tomorrow!

Waiting for the kiln to cool..

Now it's Sunday evening already and I have four days to catch up on so I'll try to be brief. Waiting for the kiln to cool was frustrating but it needs almost 2 days. So on Thursday I assembled a fun vase, using 5 wheel-thrown parts and a practical casserole.

A construction worker popped in to tell us he'd found a live but small bull snake.At 7pm Robin Dupont gave a really interesting talk on his adventure in clay so far, with his passion for wood firing abundantly clear. He is the resident mentor for the month so is giving us all sorts of advice on flashing slips, firing salt and soda etc.

Leaving Medalta we spotted a hare.