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HANDBUILDING 101

LESSON 1: Pinch Pots

Since the stone ages, human beings have been molding and shaping clay with their hands. Which method of forming came first is much like the debate over chickens and eggs. Pinch pots may not be the earliest form of construction, but they are the most direct. By shaping a lump of clay into a ball, pushing your thumb into the center, and pinching around the ball, you can create a hollow dish. This dish may be used to make other forms, or may become a simple bowl just by adding a coil foot to the bottom.

Take some time to make a series of pinched bowls. Try making one while listening to a favorite song. Try making one while listening to classical music. Try making one in silence. Compare your pinch pots. Which way of working seemed to go the best for you? Which pinch pot do you like the best? Which one do you like the least?

You can refine the shapes of your pinched pots by letting them sit for a few minutes and then scraping them to smooth their shape. You can also paddle them into other shapes if you wish.

Choose one of your pinched pots and make a foot on it by adding a wet coil of clay. Smooth the clay into the bottom of your bowl.

Now that you've had a little practice making pinched pots, you can make hollow forms. To make a rattle, start by making 15 -20 beads and shapes to go inside, these beads need to dry some so that they don't squish into a solid lump and stick to the inside of your rattle. These will be the noise makers in your rattle. They don't have to be perfect; the only way anyone will see them is if they break open your rattle.

Next, roll 2 lumps of clay into equally sized balls. Make each ball into a pinched bowl so that the 2 bowls are roughly the same size. When your bowls are finished, roll the beads you made earlier in flour, powder, or clay dust. This will make them drier so that they don't stick to the inside of the bowls or to each other. Place them inside one of your pinch pots and put the other pinch pot on top of it like a lid.

Smooth the 2 halves of the rattle together carefully leaving an air pocket trapped inside. Once the seam is sealed, there will be air trapped inside of your rattle like it was a balloon; this air will help to support the outside of your rattle while you modify its shape and decorate it. You can decorate your rattle any way you like.

When your rattle is decorated, and everything is finished, write your name and the date on the bottom and poke a tiny hole in it with a needle. This hole will allow steam and hot air to escape from the inside of your rattle when it is fired.

Now that you have had a brief introduction to pinch pots, please take some time to browse the web and find five web sites with pictures of things that other artists have done with pinch pots. Please write the URLs down in a notebook, which you should keep and use to sketch ideas for future projects.

Sketches are just ways of getting ideas on paper before you forget them. A sketch is not supposed to be a work of art; it is a tool to help you pin down an idea. Don't be afraid to make as many sketches as you need to make an idea clear. As they say, a picture is worth a thousand words!