Loading Lots of Kilns for Class (and Back Pain)

Egyptian inspired sarcophagus and coil vase by Isabella Johnson, before glaze firing.

I have three strong clay classes this quarter. The hand-builders I've written about once this quarter, and when I get my act together, I share some more of their work from this quarter. The wheel class is unusual in that the class started full and ended full. Most quarters, a few students drop after the first day or two, once they realize what the class is about. I'm not sure if they go away because they find it too difficult, their schedule changes, or they don't want to get dirty, or maybe there's something I'm doing that they dislike. I usually lose these students so early that I try not to take it personally.

Wheel thrown mug by Beau Filbert, the pink glaze was misbehaving that day.

This quarter I have 16 throwers total in the beginning level functional pottery and the advanced wheel classes, which meet at the same time. The students laughed at me the first time I said we would need to hurry through critique because the class was so large. They're used to thinking of 35 students as a large class, not 16. (I enjoy working at a college where a large class is 35, not 100) With 16 student wheels, that's the most I can fit in a class without some kind of wheel rotation schedule (I like the pun, I'm leaving it in).

One of four full carts of finished work this week. This batch was unloaded from the cone 10 reduction firing.

Last week was the last week of classes, with three days of finals next week. The last week is often crunch time for firing and finishing work, but the crunch gets worse (or better) with more students, especially when those students have more work. Since all three classes this quarter are composed mainly of hard-working, motivated students that just means there's more work to fire. 

a look into one of the oxidation firings as I was unloading it. Just one real drippy piece.

Monday was meant to be our last bisque firing, but with both bisque kilns completely stuffed, we ended up needing to fire again once those were unloaded. In fact, we ended up firing two more loads. On Wednesday we unloaded the super last final (really, I mean it) load and then later that day the super uper duper last (now I really mean it) bisque loads. Because so much wasn't bisque fired on schedule, we didn't have a chance to fire our gas kiln (cone 10 reduction) twice last week and only fired it on Thursday. 

This little bird on above the handle really caught my eye as I was unloading. I'm not sure whose work it is.

I had started having some back pain the week before, but I figured I just overdid it at boot camp or maybe had been sitting at a desk too much. My usual response is to walk or stretch or exercise it away. I also haven't really had back paint before. But by the end of the day Wednesday my back was really hurting and though I'm still not sure about the initial injury, I think the kiln loading exacerbated the pain. It probably didn't help that I was unloading hot kilns and that the one kiln is very deep.

I might have hurt my back trying to lift this big girl.

Because of the late bisques and late gas firing, after the "super last" bisque loads were done on Thursday, we needed to load the equivalent of more than a full gas kiln load in the electric kilns. The hand-builder critique is on Monday morning, so I knew I needed to get their work into the kiln last week. I mostly unloaded and loaded both kilns (all four loads) myself because students were glazing, one of my studio assistants was ill, and the other had to leave early. I usually load with more help, so that I might lift out the heavy shelves from the large kiln, but then hand them over to someone else. 

Isabella's Sarcophagus and vase after firing. Some thrown work and a woman's head are also visible.

I loaded these kilns carefully, since the hand-builders' work tended to be fairly large. In the large kiln, I put in the tall work at the bottom, but there were a couple of pieces that weren't ready when I loaded the bottom of that kiln. I saved room at the top of the smaller kiln and loaded the remaining large pieces as soon as the student finished glazing. Since throwers don't critique until Wednesday afternoon, I figured I could load and fire the remaining cone 10 work on Monday/Tuesday.

Here's something unusual that we found when unloading one of the last bisque loads. This foot had popped off an inside was some crumbly white material that felt a bit like styrofoam. If you look closely, you can see the shape of the foreign object that got lost in the clay.

My back was starting to hurt pretty bad, so I was relieved not to have to unload and load again without help. (On Monday I should have plenty of support from students and work studies and assistants.) Then, I walked out of the kiln room and looked on one of the work tables. There were two hand-builder sculptures glazed, ready to be loaded, but not on the glazed work shelf. I could tell they were meant to be loaded, and one of them was very tall. It wouldn't fit in either kiln without unloading a serious amount of work. 

We think that a silicon end of a "rubber tip" blending tool fell off, got lost in the recycled clay, then turned up in the middle of the student's clay slab. Since it was small, she didn't notice it until it caused problems with the fired ceramic piece.

So, that is the story of how I ended up coming in on Saturday (with a sore back) to unload two full electric kiln loads and then reload two full electric kiln loads so that all the work could be ready by Monday's critique. (I neglected to mention that I also needed to fire a low fire kiln load with hand-builder work, but there were only about 6 items so that load was pretty small and easy to load--once I had unloaded the cone 10 stuff). I anticipate a fun, interesting critique tomorrow. And no more kiln loading for me until next quarter.