Jon Pacini on wed 3 nov 04
Greetings All, Hi Lee---- You're right, proper wedging resolves lots of
problems. :-)
It's interesting that commercially prepared clays go through mechanical
compressing and vacuum de-airing. It tremendously changes the way a clay
performs. And it seems that a large portion of potters, at least in North
America, want to use it 'right from the bag' without any wedging.
You'd be amazed at the amount of calls I get from novice potters who can't
understand why their reconstituted scrap doesn't perform in the same manner
that the 'right from the bag' material does.
I'm not one to say that mechanically produced clay is generally superior to
hand made clay. It's just different. I think each has it's attributes and
draw backs. I once had a conversation with Paul Soldner regarding de-aired
clay, he wanted to know why Laguna used de-airing pug mills. He felt that
de-airing took all the life out of the clay. I had to say that it was solely
a matter of convenience, both for the consumers and the manufacturers.
Best regards
Jon Pacini
Clay Manager
Laguna Clay Co
-----Original Message-----
From: Lee Love [mailto:lee@mashiko.org]
Sent: Tuesday, November 02, 2004 4:29 PM
To: Jon Pacini
Cc: CLAYART@LSV.CERAMICS.ORG
Subject: Re: allergic reaction to red clay
Jon Pacini wrote:
>Slab builders and pressers seem to have the most difficulty with this
>situation. Throwing seems to blend it back in.
>
>
As will proper wedging. :-)
My iron clay is Mashiko Nami (common clay) 3 parts and Mashiko Aka
(red) 1 part, that I wedge together just before I throw it.
I recommend wedging two different colored clays like this for
beginners, to learn to wedge properly. Cut it. If there are no
spirals and the color is uniform, then you are done wedging.
--
Lee in Mashiko, Japan http://mashiko.org
http://www.livejournal.com/users/togeika/ WEB LOG
http://public.fotki.com/togeika/ Photos!
Jon Pacini on wed 3 nov 04
Greetings All---Hi Kate----You wrote---- "Oh dear...novice time again! I
prefer right from the box clay because I'm
terrified of air bubbles full of expanding steam, and don't trust my wedging
ability to get rid of them! I DO use clay I've reworked, but I'm always
very nervous about it. (I like Lee's idea of wedging two colors together to
see if you've done it right! But what if you just want one color?"(clip)
Well --I've got nothing against novices, we were all novices once.
What Paul had in mind I think is that vacuum deaired clay is conciderabley
denser than hand made and wedged clay. With mechanical pugging and deairing
all the air is compressed and vacuumed out, with hand wedging you get the
bubbles out, which can contribute to blowouts, but you never really get the
microscopic air that a vacuum chamber does.
Paul made it fairly clear at the time that the springy feel of hand made and
wedged clay was much more preferable to him than that of mechanically pugged
and de-aired clay.
As for Lee's wedging different colors of clay together ---an addition of
food coloring would certainly do the trick.
Best regards
Jon Pacini
Clay Manager
Laguna Clay Co
-----Original Message-----
From: Kate Johnson [mailto:graphicart@epsi.net]
Sent: Wednesday, November 03, 2004 10:59 AM
To: Jon Pacini
Subject: Re: was--- allergic reaction to red clay--now-- wedging
Kate
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