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Potters/Liquefied ash adds unique color, texturepacked into the kiln, the thing.” Iowa in September 2004 for► FROM PAGE 3Lon the throwing and design. Because wood is burned inside the kiln along with the pots, the ash created becomes part of the process.Hootman says the ash, when it reaches such high temperatures, becomes like liquid to flow over the surface of the pieces in the kiln, adding color and texture.“The colors I get from the wood you are not going to get any other way,” says Hootman, who lives in Cedar Rapids.His third kiln is the newest, and the largest, with a firing space that is 9 feet wide, about 7 feet high and 5 feet deep.After dozens of pieces arefront, arched entryway is bricked up. The first fire is set outside in pits on either side of that door. The pits are dug back into the kiln.Once higher temperatures are reached, a paste of clay and newspaper is applied to the bricks to make the door airtight. The openings for inserting more wood and the chimney in the back are the only sources of air.Hootman, Lee and other area artists with pieces in the 280-cubic-foot kiln then take shifts feeding and maintaining the fire.“It’s really a matter of handing the pot over to the fire,” Hootman says. “You can influence what happens, but the flames are a livingIt took Hootman seven weeks to gather the wood, approximately seven cords of pine, red elm, oak and hickory culled from the woods around his studio, to fuel the firing for five days.In packing the kiln, pieces are placed on stone shelves, with small pieces of clay holding them away from the shelf and each other. Depending on where a piece is placed, the coloration will be affected. A piece on a back shelf with things in front of it will reflect that by the way the flame and ash moves around those other items to get to the piece in the back.Lee and other top wood-fire potters from around the world will gather in Eastern“The Naked Truth,” an international wood-fire conference coordinated by Hootman and sponsored by Coe College and the University of Iowa.It will be preceded by a month-long period of work and workshops centered around Hootman’s studios. Exhibitions, including a juried show at the Cedar Rapids Museum of Art, will be held in conjunction with the conference.“I am dedicated to clay, and I try to make each piece unique as an art item,” Hootman says. If it was easy, everyone would be doing it.”■ Contact the writer: (319) 368 8809 (319) 339 3156 orjohn.kenyon@gazettecommunications.com
Newspaper Details
Cedar Rapids Gazette
Cedar Rapids, Iowa, US
Sun, Aug 24, 2003
Page 91
Full Page
Clipped by
Hiawatha L.
Iowa, USA 12 Apr 2023
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