Once again, I have just found my body's limits- I knew I was pushing too hard. but it only proves, somedays, you just shouldn't get out of bed: I lifted my head one inch from the pillow and immediately let it drop as a pain shot through the entire back of my ribcage. ok, don't panic. I can breathe, mostly.
so it's a big kiln!, especially without any bag walls. the footprint of the stacking area is three by four feet, and that goes up an average of three and a half feet... that's 45 cubic feet when you count the nooks and crannies! I would not have dared build a kiln this size if I hadn't been given free materials. but there it is, and it's in my backyard
this is one half of the pots. Jack and I will finish the rest today. notes on stacking.. the kiln was very uneven last time- why? I had opened most of the openings in the floor at the back. two at the front. I think the front was less densely packed, for one thing. it was all little pots on shelves, whereas the back was tumble-stacked big things. this time it'll be more symmetrical. I have made a few other changes. Olsen's "runaround" fastfire kiln has a low bag wall integrated into the shelving- he blocks the most direct path along the floor from firebox to flue. so see those little square bricks on the floor of my kiln- those are serving that function. maybe it ought to be extend higher. He makes a stong point about the need, therefore, to leave adequate gaps between the shelves to allow for that flame to move- an inch. so I was careful about that.
The other thing is that I figured out how to make a trick brick to open the flue in the wall during the firing if need be... to move heat toward the back, and will cover floor holes in the front with fiberboard instead of plugs so they can be pushed aside if heat is needed in the front.... I consulted with Nils Lou about bourry-boxes. He thinks a two by three foot area is necessary, with a little over half of the space below the grate bars. This would be needed for bringing the kiln up to temp with wood. But we're not really trying to do that, exactly, so I went with two smaller boxes. hopefully enough space for the wood to burn well. if these are indeed the right size, I imagine that I'll rebuild them nicely. as it is, it was a two-day slapdash affair, enough to test it and get by with wombly red bricks made by hand in the 1920's.
Candling tomorrow! I need to buy some food for the crew-
entropy. broken saw, broken bike, broken economy. batten down the hatches, me hearties! there be a red sky this morning-
actually, I'm really looking forward to a barter economy. I put in an honest day's work. it's worth something. what's it worth to you? I might even make more "money" in a different economy, getting away from this evanescent green paper would sure make a lot more sense to me- we need food and shelter, companionship. I make dishes, you grow food. lets talk. let's not haggle over who's worth more, that's an old paradigm. Let's break bread over a well-worn table, laugh and trade. trade stories, trade goods. trade real things for real things, not annuities and fisa-fickle options for fizzyfuzzy nothing paper. of course, I'm sitting pretty, with no debt, no kids, and mad skills. but we are a resourceful creation, we humans. I'm sure we'll do our god proud.
where have I been? sorry, those of you that have been wondering- after the firing, my social life (hey! i have a social life! fan-fucking-tastic!) decided that it was feeling neglected and for a while there it seemed like i was out just about every night- craziness- did I mention that I am in love with pdx? I am in love with pdx. it did take a while to adjust to life in a city. I had to learn all those genteel languaging things, all those mello make-nices. layers of the onion, you know. it's still savory. and I was looking at the calendar at the timing for the next firing- I'm a part of the pdx open studio tour- link http://www.portlandopenstudios.com/ actually, I seem to have become the little poster girl for them this year, being interviewed for the city paper and all that. (I did some work for the publicity comittee and the woman in charge decided I was a peach). so I wanted to fire before the tour (so I have something to show for all this work). which means I had to get a move on. pronto. it's been working- I would work most of the day, party at night. then the Time Based Art Festival happened. www.pica.org/tba/ and this is Exactly the kind of event that pulled me to sunny pdx. the time-based art festival is this fabulous ten day breathtaking extravaganza of international performance art. brilliant. they publish a small book as a guide to all the happenings, there are so many (on the radar. I also attended one that was sort of off the radar- link here- http://hexhexhex.blogspot.com) .
conjuring: "mamalian diving reflex" "when will we learn that time is a set of training wheels (we don't really need them)" "Derrida '...at the end, we know, all this will end very badly! there is no way to reach the absolute good. presence is always divided, split' " ... these bits are from the handbook and website... "dark heart of america, in search of the answers of what it means to be secure, and the price we are willing to pay for it" "explanation of the world as if for (or by) a child, a psychotic, or a martian" "against all odds, exposes the human experience behind hip-hop" "disinfromationalist storytelling", and the one that moved me the most, a dance duet by Leesaar the Company- a tense, riveting performance of a new relationship. she, gripped by fascination and frustration. he, with similar gesture that fit better on her body. open and close, open and shake... I saw many powerful performances. I'll try to imbed a video of a site-specific performance done at the keller fountain, designed by an architect whose wife is a dancer- Anna Halprin. one special sunday they turned off the fountain and the dancers emerged, moved, splashed, played, and submerged again.. Pica filmed it- I'll try to get it to you- I was jealous of those (albeit cold) dancers- I would do that- I would love to get involved in this kind of art- maybe next year.
so that's what i did for a while. and pretty much after that I holed up and finished my clay-working time. thats' over, now I'm glazing and building these cheap but kinda un-aesthetic bourry-boxes on the kiln- they look like weird red-brick mittens on the front. I don't love them, but what's a girl to do? I didn't think through the wood-fire part of this kiln at all. now I'm having to deal with it- maybe they're way too big (asked Nils Lou for advice)- we'll see- maybe I'll re-make them later..
So life is great, life is flippn busy at the moment- going to fire early next week (oct 1), then seattle for a wkshop with Al Tennant, have to buy a bisq kiln cuz mine is about as dead as they get. (entropy, anyone?), and hopefully get to visit with some friends up there, and then unload, and the studio tour for two weekends, and a cash job repairing gutters and clambering around on a roof, and then Mam is coming to visit and we'll go out to the ocean (!!!!!!), and by then it will be raining constantly, so I'll be making pots again. and STILL not riding a motorcycle. good things come to those who wait, right? (my sweet ride has terrible compression, apparently, so it's not worth the many hundreds needed for an eletrical fix- sad sad potter with itchy feet)
much love-
C
this is one half of the pots. Jack and I will finish the rest today. notes on stacking.. the kiln was very uneven last time- why? I had opened most of the openings in the floor at the back. two at the front. I think the front was less densely packed, for one thing. it was all little pots on shelves, whereas the back was tumble-stacked big things. this time it'll be more symmetrical. I have made a few other changes. Olsen's "runaround" fastfire kiln has a low bag wall integrated into the shelving- he blocks the most direct path along the floor from firebox to flue. so see those little square bricks on the floor of my kiln- those are serving that function. maybe it ought to be extend higher. He makes a stong point about the need, therefore, to leave adequate gaps between the shelves to allow for that flame to move- an inch. so I was careful about that. 
