New technique in pottery on show

Press, 10 August 1982, Page 15

New technique in pottery on show

Sumner potter Valerie Crichton has come full circle since she took up pottery classes as a hobby 15 years ago at the Risingholme Community Centre in Opawa. Now a potter of some note, she teaches the art form at Risingholme, and to members of the Mount Pleasant Potterv Club.

Although skilled in porcelain work, she has concentrated more recently on the relatively new “low firing" technique, where there is a direct and spontaneous involvement with fire 'and smoke. The results are colourful and vigorous. Christchurch people will have a chance to see the results of these experiments during an exhibition by Valerie Crichton at the C.S.A. Gallery from August 17 to 29. When low firing, she makes "very controlled and fairly formal" shapes from clay," before applying glazes and washes, sometimes using brushes she has made herself.

She fires the pieces for 45 minutes in a small homemade ceramic fibre kiln with a removeable lid, which is fuelled with liquefied petroleum gas. When the

glaze starts to gleam. Valerie Crichton dons asbestos gloves and a woollen hat. and with tongs removes the red-hot pots. Instantly, the pots are put into a cradle of organic material, such as sawdust, shavings, or pine needles, which create unique smoke patterns across the still hot pieces. They are cooled, and cleaned.

The term "low firing" is used because the kiln is heated to what would be considered a low temperature for ceramic pieces.

Valerie Crichton said the technique had been ’ developed in Japan as Raku, and had also caught on in the United States. She learnt about it from pottery journals, and organised a workshop so the Auckland potter, Brian Gartside. could demonstrate the skill.

“Most people do not really understand what is involved in low firing," she said. “About 90 per cent think pottery is what you can drink coffee from, or make beef Stroganoff in." "These are art pieces. Through lack of exposure people do not often understand them.”

Valerie Crichton enjoys making things which are “difficult and risky.” She finds her home on Clifton Hill, above the sea, provides plenty of inspiration for the atmospheric conditions, sea and estuary patterns she tries to capture through her pottery. “Pottery is a much more complicated craft than some. That is what holds you to it," she said.

There was the aspect of making a piece, then the chemistry of glazing it, plus the control of firing it. “As you touch one horizon, there is another horizon." she said. "It is an elusive thing and you are continually striving for something else."

Valerie Crichton finds she may work intensively on a variety of pieces for perhaps two months, and then take a complete rest. “I feel I have to work intensively to develop the fluidity in the pieces," she said.

Her exhibition at the C.S.A., which will be shared with the painter Sally Powell, will include 70 pieces of low fired and porcelain work. They range in price from about $l5 to $BO.