Ceramic Books

Encourage elementary and middle school-age kids to build their clay-sculpting skills at home with these lessons and projects designed for use in the classroom. They'll model a pinch pot, coil animals, fossils, vases, masks, and tiles that they can embellish with rubber stamps. Best of all, these projects will foster children's confidence in their abilities and stimulate new ideas.

Dietz, curator of decorative arts at the Newark Museum, discusses what he terms the beautiful pot, the classic pot, the painterly pot, the sculptural pot, the useful pot, the narrative pot, the worshipful pot, and the impossible pot in his illuminating text, and teapots, covered and open vessels, small pots, vases, and bottles are also included in this outstanding overview.

In this book, Michael Hardy looks at the traditional handbuilding methods?pinching, coiling, slab building, and pressmolding?and explains how to do them. For many years these methods were eclipsed by throwing on a potter's wheel which came to dominate as a making method. However, in the past 30 years handbuilding has once again become a preferred technique among ceramic artists. These artists are engaged in exploring the creative possibilities that handbuilding offers, experimenting fully with and combining techniques in an effort to achieve their artistic vision.

Chapters cover everything from the basics, including common terminology, firing, mixing, reprocessing, and wedging, to advanced techniques such as surface treatments, joining, and creating lidded, composite, and large forms. Close-up profiles of ten top ceramicists, including Susan Wechsler and Paula Winokur, explore their distinctive approaches to handbuilding, complete with tips and how-tos. Clay-body and glaze recipes, plus more than 250 black-and-white illustrations.

This volume begins with the modeling of cubes, cones, spheres, and other basic volumes. Students then learn coiling, pinching, using strips, slabs, and lumps and how to apply them to bowls, bottles, cups, boxes, and sculpture, with information on kilns, firing, and finishing processes included.

Triplett offers a guide to basic techniques, from pinch pots to slapwork, with color illustrations of tools and techniques and instructions for eight projects of planters and pitchers. Tending toward the colorful and whimsical, these projects are a delight to see.

Here are directions for many creative, fun-to-do pottery projects potters can follow to produce handsome finished objects without need of a potter's wheel. The author instructs in coil, slab, mold, and pinch techniques to produce pots, bowls, vases, tiles, and other decorative pieces. She also advises on acquiring basic tools, mixing and preparing clay, and using coloring agents. Newcomers to pottery crafting will especially appreciate her tips for making projects easier to accomplish, such as use of a hairdryer at regular intervals for drying out too-wet clay, and easy methods for keeping clay soft and pliable. Step-by-step color photos with detailed captions guide handcrafters through each project from start to finish. Many photos are of the cutaway type to show correct hand positions for controlling the clay, both inside and outside the form. Here's the book that takes the mystery out of handbuilding in clay, demonstrating each step in the pottery-making process. More than 400 color photos.

This is the only full four-color introductory ceramics text available that combines a thorough appreciation of the aesthetics of ceramic art with extensive discussions of the history of ceramics as well as techniques for working in clay. Net Wt. is 4.22 lbs.

This book is the first of its kind: a celebration of fifty contemporary artists from around the world who have chosen to create the human form in clay. There is a detailed account of each artist's work, including biographical details and precise descriptions of their working methods. In addition, each artist has been asked to name a major source of inspiration, whether another artist or key work, in any medium and from any culture, explaining the reasons for their choice. The resulting depictions, ranging from the Willendorf Venus to a Michelangelo Pieta, combine with stunning photos of the artists' work to make this a book that will inform and inspire.

From Abrasive to Zirconium, this alphabetical pottery guide provides easy to find information on terms, techniques, processes, equipment, and much more. Whatever the potter needs to find, its here in concise, yet comprehensive, definitions. Net Wt. is 2.27 lbs.