I’m three months into my apprenticeship at Mary Fox Pottery and boy have I been busy! I’m learning a lot and while I feel at times like I’m taking one step forward and two steps back, in the grand scheme of things I know my skills are improving. Most young potters (and even the older ones) will tell you they have good potting days and bad ones. It’s easy to focus on the bad ones and feel like you aren’t making progress, but practice is still progress!
So, on the matter of progress… January saw me conquer the heart bowl! After weeks of repetition, including one afternoon where I got carried away in my “creative zone” and ended up with some rather droopy apple-shaped hearts, Mary stepped into the creation room and looked over my latest batch of bowls. The moment I had waited for.
“I wouldn’t know these were not made by me. Good job!” she said. The thrill of hearing those words! I felt a real sense of accomplishment. Working on the heart bowls has also given me the opportunity to practice throwing off the hump—a technique of throwing small pieces one after the other from a mound of clay on the wheel. This method is starting to feel more natural to me than it did a few months ago and it is a much faster way of throwing the small bowl forms that are later shaped into hearts.
Following the success of the heart bowls, I began on mugs. The cup forms—in a variety of shapes and sizes—were coming along quite nicely but trying to pull a handle as good as a Mary Fox handle was frustrating to say the least. In demo after demo, she made it look so easy. After almost two months of practicing, I’m still not quite there but I am seeing gradual progress and don’t get nearly as stressed out by the process as I once did.
Seeing my frustration with how the handles were not turning out as I wanted, Mary gave me another form to work on to mix it up a bit. I began making her “small bowls” and “manly bowls”. And recently I’ve been working on plates—many potters’ least favorite thing to throw. For me, throwing them is the fun part. When it comes to trimming them, however, well that’s a different story.
The main takeaways from my first few months include firstly realizing how difficult it is to emulate the subtleties of another potter’s work, particularly when that work is by someone who has been potting as long as Mary Fox. Secondly, I’m learning how easy it is for external factors that impact my mood to affect my work. I’ve always known this, it’s just more obvious now that I’m at the wheel more often and can’t step away like I could when potting was a hobby. Thirdly, it’s more clear than ever how important core strength and proper body mechanics are in this field, particularly for those planning a long career as a potter.
Till next time,
Sarah