Course Syllabus Functional Pottery I

PC 130 Functional Pottery I

Class Hours Per Week: 3

Laboratory Hours Per Week: 16

Semester Credit Hours: 7

Contact Hour/Lab Credit Ratio: 4:1

Prerequisites: none

Description: Functional Pottery I covers the basic elements of designing and producing utilitarian pottery, including wall thickness, balance and proportion, surface decoration, and glazing and firing techniques. Topics include bowls, mugs, plates, casseroles, stemware, and bottles, with emphasis on safe glazing and supervised firing. Upon completion, students should be able to produce a variety of functional pots, apply a glaze, and load and assist firing a kiln.

Upon completion students should be able to:

• Work with large amounts of clay
• Make refined mugs, bowls, baking dishes, casseroles, pitchers
• Make basic stemware, teapots, oil lamps, electric lamps
• Make complicated lid types such as inset and flange lids
• Make advanced handle types by pulling, extruding, and slab
• Demonstrate trimming techniques to produce footed and unfooted forms
• Mix glaze with minimum to no supervision
• Load and fire bisque kilns with no supervision
• Prepare and glaze pots with minimum supervision
• Load and fire glaze kiln with supervision, demonstrating safety
• Develop an organized personal notebook of clay, glaze, and firing techniques

Course Outline

I. TERMINOLOGY OF THE PROFESSION

1. Glaze and glaze materials
2. Kiln and firing terminology

II. SAFETY CONCERNS FOR THE POTTER

1. Mixing and applying glazes
2. Safely loading and firing kilns
3. Documentation of the firing process

III. GLAZE MATERIALS

1. Raw material list
2. Oxides in raw materials

IV. STUDENT RESEARCH

1. Survey of suppliers
2. Cost analysis of glaze materials (optional software)
3. Glaze math

V. CLAY BODIES AND THEIR FEATURES

1. Earthenware
2. Stoneware
3. Porcelain

VI. MATERIALS FOR CLAY BODIES

1. Plastic materials
2. Non-plastic materials
3. Shrinking and drying

VII. CREATING A PERSONAL NOTEBOOK

1. Glaze recipes
2. Technical information
3. Firing techniques
4. Notes
5. Other section of your choice

VIII. KILN FIRING

1. Reduction theory
2. Kiln loading properties
3. Salt glazing option
4. Sagger firing option

IX. SURFACE DECORATION

1. Incising
2. Sgraffito/slips
3. Faceting
4. Fluting
5. Others

X. THROWING FINE STEMWARE FORMS

1. Goblets
2. Water glasses
3. Candlesticks
4. Candles goblets
5. Teapots
6. Oil lamps
7. Electric lamps

XI. ADVANCED TECHNIQUES

1. Inset and flange lids
2. Handle types formed by pulling, extruding, and slab techniques
3. Trimming to produce footed and unfooted forms

XII. BISQUE LOADING AND FIRING WITHOUT SUPERVISION

XIII. THROWING MORE ADVANCED FORMS

1. Large bowls
2. Stacking bowls
3. Larger bowls with handles and without
4. Jugs with handles
5. Mugs
6. Casseroles

XIV. GLAZE MIXING WITH MINIMUM TO NO SUPERVISION

1. Recipes
2. Using gram scales
3. Mixing equipment
4. Exploring glaze software

XV. GLAZE APPLICATION WITH MINIMUM SUPERVISION

1. Preparation and waxing pots
2. Application Techniques

XVI. PERSONAL GLAZE INVENTORY

1. Test of sample tiles
1. Select glaze recipes
2. Weigh out test batches
3. Fire, adjust results, and refire
2. Generating new glazes
1. Molecular part method
2. Range of material method
3. Altering existing glazes
3. Organized glaze and firing techniques notebook
4. Palette clearly marked for reference

XVII. USING THE GLAZE KILN WITH MINIMUM SUPERVISION

1. Demonstration of safety
2. Gas and electric
3. Oxidation or reduction
4. Stacking process
5. Firing theory
6. Unloading and cleanup

XVIII. THROWING MORE ADVANCED FORMS

1. Vases
2. Lidded containers
3. Candle lanterns
4. Large and small plates
5. Fountains

STUDENT WILL complete 10 of the following 16 projects:

1. 12 pieces of stemware - experiment with surface decoration
1. goblets
2. water glasses
3. candlestick
4. candle goblets
5. pedestal mugs
2. 12 bowls
1. Small, medium, and large bowls
2. Bowls must exhibit 3 approaches to top rim
3. Bowls should show three approaches to foot rim
3. 4 lidded casseroles
1. Vary handles
2. Try several lids
3. Try surface decoration
4. 2 teapots
1. Experiment with form
2. Surface decoration
3. Approach to handles
5. 6 lidded containers
1. Try several lids
2. Try surface decoration
6. 12 mugs
1. Mug should exhibit several handle ideas
2. Design your own extruder die
3. Try surface decoration
7. 10 jugs / bottles
1. Must have handles or attachments forms for surface decoration
8. 6 open baking dishes
1. May be altered forms
2. Vary handles
3. Vary top rims
9. 12 tiles
10. 4 lamps
11. Oil lamps (6 bead, 4 kerosene)
12. 5 candle lanterns
13. 6 vases
14. 2 stacking bowls
15. 2 fountains
16. 4 large, 4 small plates

Student will complete all the following glaze projects.

All students will also produce a collection of tiles for a glaze palette clearly marked for reference