Exploring Ancient African Pottery Techniques
Africa has an unparalleled legacy when it comes to pottery. One of the oldest art forms, clay pottery dates back to 6000 BC, a testament not only to human creative skill but also to the durability of the material. Clay, being plentiful in Africa, has been shaped, designed, and fired by countless generations, leaving us a rich legacy of anthropological and artistic history to delve into.
The pottery techniques commonly used by ancient African potters can be broadly classified into three types; coiling, pinching, and wheel throwing.
1. Coiling: This technique involves the process of constructing pottery by rolling out coils or ropes of clay and then smoothing the surface. This was the most common method of pottery making in Sub-Saharan Africa due to the relative ease and lesser tools needed.
2. Pinching: This is a simple technique where the clay is shaped by inserting the thumb of one hand into the clay and lightly pinching the clay between the thumb and fingers while slowly rotating the ball in the palm of the other hand.
3. Wheel Throwing: The potter’s wheel was less common in early African pottery but was adopted later, leading to more uniform and larger creations.
Notably, African potters, especially in West Africa, typically didn’t use the pottery wheel but built pots by hand. Women predominantly took on the role of pottery-makers. Their creativity manifested in the intricate designs, etchings, and patterns scored onto the vessel surfaces, reflecting the cultural and aesthetic values of their societies.
Africa’s pottery offerings are hand-designed with geometric patterns, stylized motifs, and intricate detailing. The patterns often hold culturally significant meaning in storytelling, genealogy, and folklore. Over the years, motifs found in different regions have come to symbolize the potter’s community or tribe, each warding off evil spirits or signifying family ties. In many communities, the jar shapes are also region-specific.
Paints, pigments, and slips are used for decoration before and after firing. The firing process itself ranges from open firing to sophisticated kilns. Some communities even buried pots in the ground and set surface fires above them to achieve the right temperatures.
Today, the legacy of ancient African pottery deeply influences modern African ceramics. The methods of hand-building, techniques of surface decoration, and the organic, earthy qualities are still present in contemporary works. Many modern-day African potters continue to use ancient African techniques, materials, and aesthetic considerations to produce their work, making them the bearers of a thousands-year-old tradition.
Several modern ceramic artists, not just in Africa but throughout the world, incorporate these historical and cultural elements in their works as a nod to early African craftsmanship. This ancient craft truly continues to shape and enrich the pottery world.
Loading an Electric Kiln (for Glazing)
In this video, I show you how I stack my top loading kiln for a glaze firing. Then of course we peek the results at the end.
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Electric Pottery Kiln Bisque Firing
In This Video, I Share Some of My Tips and Tricks for Bisque Fire Loading. Tools, Supplies.
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Moroccan Cobalt Blue
The famous cobalt blue is the signature of Fès pottery. This imperial city is known as the handicraft capital.
You can admire superb collections in the Dar Batha Museum. This Hispano-Moorish palace dating from the end of the 14th century houses some admirable collections of traditional art from Fez.
After being baked for 24 hours and then slowly cooled, the pottery is covered with white tin-glaze. The craftsmen use a secret proportion and combination of several ingredients to obtain the lovely and unique blue.
08.1.11
Aldermaston Pottery – Berkshire, England
Andrew Hazelden who has worked at Aldermaston Pottery for over twenty years.
The Aldermaston Pottery was founded in Berkshire in 1955 by Alan Caiger-Smith and Geoffrey Eastop, and over the years the studio has been home to many fine potters.
The potters at Aldermaston, who number about half-a-dozen, work both as a team, for production work, and individually, for studio pieces.
The Pottery is noted mainly for its tin-glaze wares, but also produces porcelain.
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Burslem Pottery Spectis (England)
This pitcher and basin was made in a popular pottery town of Burslem, England, based on the mark on the bottom that says: “The Burslem Pottery Co” (England, Spectis). If anyone can fill me in on what “Spectis” means, I’d love to know.
Based on these two references, this company made pottery from 1894-1933.
1) http://bickler.co.nz/china/potteries.php?potter=45
2) http://www.thepotteries.org/allpotters/209.htm
If you know anything about this, or want to make an offer, email me (see contact page).
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How to Display Your Pottery Collection
I wanted to share these two photos of cool displays from Orin Zebest from Flikr.com.
Perhaps they will give you some ideas on how to build your own display case. I’m sure a carpenter could easily handle the first one.
The second photo shows glass (or plexiglass) mounted shelves. This might be nicer for displaying a glass collection.
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Pottery of Deruta (Italy)
Pottery shop in Deruta, Italy. The Italian hillside town of Deruta is known throughout the world for its spectacular pottery. For more than six centuries, Deruta craftspeople have produced and exported ceramics.
The local clay was good for ceramics, whose production began in the Early Middle Ages, but found its artistic peak in the 15th and early 16th century, with highly characteristic local styles, such as the “Bella Donna” plates with conventional portraits of beauties, whose names appear on fluttering banderoles with flattering inscriptions. The lack of fuel enforced low firing temperatures, but from the beginning of the 16th century, Deruta compensated with its metallic lustre glazes in golds and ruby red. In the 16th century Deruta produced the so-called “Rafaellesque” ware, decorated with fine arabesques and grottesche on a fine white ground.
Deruta, with Gubbio and Urbino, continues to produced some of the finest Italian maiolica.
06.21.11Shopping in Granville Island Market
Granville Island, Vancouver, British Columbia (Canada) has a great public market. This photo was taken there, so it’s a great place to shop for pottery and other home made items and art work.
http://www.granvilleisland.com/public-market
06.15.11
HorseHair Pots
I first saw “horsehair p
ots” in Colorado Springs, Colorado, and now wish I would have bought one. You also see them in New Mexico quite frequently. I was surprised that they really are made with horse hairs, giving them a marble-like appearance. At first, you might think these pots were made by Native Americans for 100s of years, but in fact, the process was created in the 1980s, when a long hair fell against the pot, leaving an interesting singe mark of burned carbon on the clay surface.
These horsehair pots range in height from 1 1/2″ (small one on front left) to 6 1/4″ (lidded jar in middle). The black ring around the top is actually a black raku glaze.
The horse hairs form the squigly lines on the white clay body. When the horse hair burns into the clay body, in some instances, the smoke from the burning raises and provides a smoke effect.
The pots shown here are from this studio: http://www.windblownstudio.com/horsehair.htm