Hand Building with Sunshine
For three days in early July, 16 of us plus Antonia and Kim, basked in pure Sunshine. We were introduced to various hand-building techniques, tricks, and tools (the Sunshine Stick) that elevated our own hand-building skills to a new level. Sunshine Cobb generously shared her knowledge, humor and unbridled encouragement as she guided us through three days of template making, coil building, (heavy on the coil building) and slab building.
The workshop started with a colorful slide show narrated by Sunshine discussing the evolution of her ceramic journey from her days as a student at California State University at Sacramento to the time spent in Utah working on her MFA in Ceramics from Utah State University and now as a new homeowner and active teacher and potter residing in Helena, Montana.
As an undergraduate, she became enamored of wood firing and creating functional pots. Over the years she has developed her own unique voice in clay, built on original interests and images she sees around her, whether it is a rusty wheelbarrow or the grill of an old pick-up truck. Those images stick with her and are incorporated into her work. Her goal, as she explained over those three days in July, is to contribute to the world in a beautiful way and in a way that brings her pleasure. She learned to create a matte finish after using commercial glazes by sandblasting her work. Recently, she has developed a more accessible glazing process of using red clays fired at cone 1 fired again after applying a coaxial blend slip she has created and then under firing to cone 3 after applying one of her bright pastel glazes. The end product reveals areas of red clay breaking through the slip and the glaze especially where texture has been created. Sunshine has now moved on to a deep black clay but employs the same method.
Sunshine reminded us to think about how an object will be used as we are building it and to make sure the lines of the piece flow harmoniously. For example, she warned us about simply sticking a handle or a knob on a piece without consideration of how it continued the lines of the piece. Instead, she reminded us to consider the entire piece and whether the handle flows naturally from the rest of the piece or does it look and feel like a misplaced appendage. She explained the importance of tapping into the feeling we get when we create a piece and how that feeling can aid us in the construction. If it does not feel right, there is a good chance we are doing something wrong and to learn from that. It was great when she acknowledged that she made everything look a whole lot easier than it was because then we did not feel so inept but rather became excited when we finally “got it” or believed that eventually, with practice we would “get it.”
Sunshine encouraged us to understand and embrace the chemistry of ceramics especially the relationship between clay and glazes. She explained that success is born out of a ton of failures and that we should not be afraid of these failures because we learn something with each failed endeavor. Sunshine challenged us each day with her pearls of wisdom and got us not to take our hand-building too seriously when she asked: “Why should seriousness be the outcome of art instead of whimsy and fun?” When we answered this question for ourselves, choosing fun and whimsy over seriousness, I believe a weight was lifted and each participating potter was free to find her mojo. Some of us arrived early the next two mornings to work on what we learned the day before, others skipped or shortened the lunch break, some continued to build at home in the evenings after class. It was clear everybody wanted more, we loved the Sunshine and we did not want it to end.
In addition to the various cool techniques and tips she shared over the course of those three days, Sunshine also introduced us to her go-to tools: the scalpel, the long wood knife, and of course the amazing Sunshine Stick. Although the Sunshine Stick is the truth and an absolute game changer, Sunshine told us her favorite tool was herself, because if she does not show up in the studio nothing happens. The tips she shared have now been added to our own individual toolboxes and given us a strong footing to revisit all of the functional items she demonstrated during the workshop. We cringed when she cut a piece in half so that we could see how the piece was constructed from the inside. We gasped knowing that perfectly constructed mug was sacrificed for our education and wanted to put it back together because it was so beautiful and so beautifully made by Sunshine. Eventually, we appreciated and learned from the sacrificed destruction of her hand-built pieces and focused on making our own candle sticks, garlic boxes, tapas plates, cake stands, mugs, weed pots, bowls and scoops.
Those three days felt like the best of summer camp and I did not want it to end. If you ever have the opportunity to take a class with Sunshine, treat yourself, you won’t regret it. If you can’t wait until she comes back to town visit her website (www.sunshinecobb.com) and take an online class or purchase her books: Mastering Hand Building and the Beginners Guide to Hand Building. Oh and grab a Sunshine Stick while you are at it, it’s life-changing once you figure it out. Sunshine is an amazing teacher, a fantastic potter and she gave herself freely to each and every one of us. She was patient, she was kind, she was funny … she was Sunshine!
*And yes, Sunshine is her real name, just ask her sister Feather and her brother Sunrise.