Jane Ward

Jane answers the question:Can I use beach clay to make pottery?

[See Jane's beautiful work at Trinket & Fern]

“My Front Yard” at low tide. This is where I get my clay.  At high tide this area is filled with 10 feet of water. It doesn’t look it but this is mainly hard white sand. These flats are also covered with clammers during the winter months it is supposedly one of the richest clam beds in the world.  We often sneak down and grab a few steamers as well.

 

 I think that you can see the vein of clay running along the marsh.

 

This is me digging the clay, if I were smart, it would be easier if I had some water shoes on. Life is a little lazy down there. For some reason the clay is always full of sea worms.

 

View of the beach and clam flats at high tide. You can see the mainland on the horizon. By boat about a 2 mile ride, since it is an island there is no other transportation. So if it is a choppy day on the water, many unfired pots do not survive the rough journey.  My studio is on the mainland.

 

Our path to the wharf and beaches. It is at least 100 years old. But I guess it’s age is obvious.

 

This is a sample of how the Native Americans, who lived on my island hundreds of years ago, may have fired their pots. It is called smoke firing. To give it an interesting effect you add seaweed and marsh grass to the fire and you burnish it with a river stone. After it was fired I added copper leaf to it, just to punch it up. This method of firing is for decorative use only, but I really like them.

 

Here is one of the rooms in my studio, it is a cozy studio out in the middle of the woods. I have an old tv, and a friend who used to own a video store and has kept 100s of old movies. So that is what helps me to stay working for long periods of time. I just listen to old, not very good movies all day long. The horror ones helps me to work faster.

 

This is the second of three rooms in my studio, the glaze room, and this is my husband creating yet another glaze. He is the “master” at creating new glazes.

 

Finally is my dog “Igby” who comes with me everyday to the studio. He likes to sleep “under his bed” with the clay. The majority of time I am here alone, so he is good company. Pottery is my full time occupation, even though it is not a prosperous one. That is why my husband definitely keeps his day job as an engineer and considers pottery as a part time hobby. I started out taking night classes at a studio where my husband was my teacher, and that is how we met.