The Throwing Process in Ceramic Production

Abstract

Crafts acquired the aura of a foil to the modernist sensibility in art which has deeply evolved even to incestuous designs. In pottery, particularly, artists found an ideal instrument with which to undermine cultural values "found out" to be decadent. Pottery is to democratize the reach of art; it is securely rooted in popular culture, as against modernism's moonings in an inbred, "high" culture. Pottery also benefits from its deep mystical connections with oriental and ancient thought, something attractive to those disillusioned by the nihilism of western civilization. Pottery's idolized initial longings found enthusiastic reception among artists in such obscure places such as the Philippines. Forming pottery on wheel, called throwing was done by the early Egyptian and Greek potters. The wheel consisted of a flat rock turning on another rock with one hand, while the other hand, formed the clay. Today, the primitive stone-type wheel, but made ofwood, is used by barangay potters in the Philippines as they tum out rice pots, water jars and flower pots. Pottery studios, schools offering ceramics and industries are now using electric potters' wheel for convenience. Anyone who endeavors in practicing throwing will spend much time at the outset in mastering the centering, hollowing, raising and shaping before he attempts to produce wares. This paper describes the throwing process as it is done at the Ceramics Research and Productivity Center of the University ofNorthern Philippines.