The Beginner's Guide to Decorating Pottery
An Introduction to Glazes, Patterns, Inlay, Luster, and Dimensional Designs
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- $15.99
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- $15.99
Publisher Description
Join ceramic artist Emily Reinhardt to learn how to decorate pottery surfaces with glazes, gold luster, patterns and marks, inlay designs, dimensional shapes, and much more.
With an emphasis on learning new skills, having fun, and embracing imperfection, The Beginner’s Guide to Decorating Potterysupports your creative process as you explore:
Basic information on working with clays as well as materials used for decorating. Tutorials on color theory, combining form and function, and the importance of keeping a sketchbook. Beginner-friendly projects that show how to apply surface-design techniques to simple pieces such as coasters, a cheeseboard, a wall hanging, plates, tumblers, vases, planters, and more.
Throughout the book, skill-building is front and center, with tips and tricks to help you crack the code and make pieces you’re proud of. Gallery work from some of today’s top ceramics artists is sure to inspire potters of all levels. What will you make first?
For beginners and those returning to ceramics, the Essential Ceramics Skills series from Quarry Books offer the fundamentals along with fresh, contemporary, and simple projects that build skills progressively.
Explore even more ceramics techniques with:The Beginner’s Guide to Wheel Throwing and The Beginner’s Guide to Hand Building.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Ceramics artist Reinhardt debuts with a helpful primer on ceramic surface design techniques. These include additive and subtractive relief (adding clay shapes to or carving out clay from the surface of a piece); applying glaze, underglaze (paint put on before the glazing process), and luster; and inlaying (using different colors of clay in one piece). Reinhardt shows how to put these techniques to use with straightforward projects. For example, creating coasters involves applying black and white glaze in a checker pattern on small circular pieces of fired clay, while the more ambitious planter is constructed by adding decorative rectangles to the side of a large clay bowl. Expounding on her "top five design principles" (form, color, pattern, texture, and function) to consider when decorating pottery, she encourages readers to find inspiration for patterns by walking through nature and notes that clays with lots of grog (granular bits of "ground up fired clay") "finish with a rough, earthy, speckled texture." Despite the book's title, Reinhardt writes that readers "should already have a basic understanding of the ceramics process," and true beginners may struggle to follow the undefined terminology (bisqueware, underglaze, slip-casting). Still, intermediate ceramicists will appreciate the ideas on how to liven up their pottery. This is worth a look.
