Photo by Bandelier National Monument, via Flickr.

Ceramics
 are perhaps the most ubiquitous of all art forms to have emerged
from human history. The oldest known ceramic figurine, Venus of
Dolní Věstonice, traces back to the Czech Republic in 29,000–
25,000 B.C., during the Upper Paleolithic period, and a
2012 study published in the journal Science confirmed that the
earliest known ceramic pots, found in Xianrendong Cave in
China’s Jiangxi Province, were made during the height of the Ice
Age. That means they predated the emergence of agriculture in the
Neolithic period by some 10,000 years—a development that
scientists previously believed had led to the creation of fired clay
vessels for cooking and storing food. Ceramics—in the form of
bricks, tiles, vessels, and sculptures—have endured for millennia,
and the medium continues to be explored today.
Modern and contemporary artists such as 
Ken Price
, 
Betty Woodman
, 
The Haas Brothers
, 
John Mason
, 
Lucie Rie
, and 
Ron Nagle
, to name only a few, have employed ceramic techniques as old as
time to create radical and sophisticated artworks that can be found
in galleries, museums, and art and design fairs today. Below, we
dig up the origins, processes, and influences behind the
foundational ceramic techniques.
Handbuilding

Left: Maya (artist), Teotihuacan ritual object (350-500). Image courtesy of the Walters Art Museum. Right: Ron
Nagle, Incense Burner (1990). Image courtesy of Ferrin Contemporary, North Adams.

The relationship between hands and clay is the basis of the

ceramic art form. When you put your hands to clay, the natural
inclination to form, shape, and ultimately create something from
the fine-grained soil is inescapable. Handbuilt objects can be
produced by pinching balls of clay, joining slabs, or creating coils.
“Handbuilding, a combination of coil, carving, pounding, and
squishing, has taken center stage in the art world,” says Adam
Welch, an art lecturer at Princeton University and director of
Greenwich House Pottery, the oldest non-profit ceramics studio in
the country (since 1909). “It seems most adequate to fight the
slickness of conceptual art and most adaptable toward a return to
an inner impulse.” And while certain vessels would be easier to
achieve using one of these processes over another, Welch notes
that “it all depends on style, taste, and one’s tolerance.”

Pinching

Left: Female Figure (ca. 3500-3400 B.C.E.). Image courtesy of the Brooklyn Museum, Charles Edwin Wilbour
Fund. Right: Betty Woodman, Italian Pillow Pitcher (1977). Image courtesy of David Kordansky Gallery, Los
Angeles.
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Khnum, the Egyptian deity of water and pottery, was believed to

have created the first children using his potter’s wheel and clay
from the banks of the Nile. This Egyptian statuette from ca. 3500–
3400 B.C., in the Predynastic period, was not made with a potter’s
wheel, however. In this era, Egyptians employed the pinching
method to create remarkably thin-walled vessels and
representational figures out of hollowed-out pieces of brownish-
red clay also known as terracotta. After the object’s final form was
pinched to perfection, it was dried in the sun, polished smooth
with a stone, and painted to endow it with features such as hair
and clothing. This female figure’s small, pointed head may be an
exaggeration of the nose to symbolize “the source of the breath of
life,” as described by the Brooklyn Museum, where the work
resides.
The American artist 
Betty Woodman
’s contemporary work invokes the ancient traditions of the
ceramic arts in Egypt, China, and Greece, imparting new life into 
vases
, pitchers, cups, and the human form. Woodman’s “Pillow
Pitcher” series is not only inspired by the Cretan pitchers from the
Minoan civilization (about 3000–1100 B.C.), but is created as if
from that era, mimicking the basic technique used to create them,
and also featuring elaborate designs. To create a pitcher,
Woodman pinched two cylindrical pots together from one end to
the other horizontally, then concealed the jointed area by
wrapping a strip of clay around the middle section, which also
forms the pitcher spout and handle. After drying, firing, and
glazing, she painted the vessels in the styles of 
Matisse
 and 
Picasso
.
Many contemporary artists working with objects depend on
assistants to execute much of their work, but not 86-year-old
Woodman. “I have a deep-rooted love for ceramics and a passion
about it and a knowledge of it. It’s just part of who I am,”
she says. “I really like doing my work myself. I’m not interested
in having somebody else do the work.… It’s about my touch and
my hand.”
How it Works
Shape a piece of clay into a smooth ball about the size of your
hand. As you hold the clay sphere, press your thumb into the
center of the ball, about halfway down to the bottom. As you
revolve the ball with one hand, press the walls out evenly with
your thumb on the inside and your fingers on the outside. Smooth
the surface with a damp sponge.

Slab Construction
Left: Effigy urn in the form of the Sun God, 12th–14th century, Mexico, Maya. Image courtesy of Fine Arts
Museums of San Francisco, Gift of Lewis K. and Elizabeth M. Land. Right: John Mason, Twin Blue Figure
2 (2015). Image courtesy of David Kordansky Gallery, Los Angeles.

Found in Indian and Mesopotamian architecture, ceramic tiles are

believed to have been constructed from slabs of clay since 14,000
B.C. Effigy urn in the form of the Sun God from 12th–14th-
century Mesoamerica is formed from a slab of unglazed clay (also
called earthenware). The figure’s elaborate garb, jewelry, and
headdress represent the god’s divinity—as the protector against
everything from drought to illness. In ancient Mayan culture, slab-
built lids and bases for vessels, boxes, and incense burners were
used alongside coiled pots and clay slips to create the intricate
decorative arts that the Mayans are well-known for.
California artist 
John Mason
, one of the leading advocates of ceramics as a fine art, has been
engaging in slab construction for more than 50 years, creating
modern ceramic totems that can only be fully appreciated in
person. Mason’s “Figure” works are the result of rolled, shaped,
fired, and glazed slabs of clay positioned meticulously on top of
one another in geometric formations. “There was the question of
whether it was going to be a unique object or was it going to be a
tool with which you explored the possibilities of the material?”
Mason says of the many contingencies inherent to the process of
slab construction. “Which meant you didn’t necessarily know
where you were going or how you were going to get there.… Clay
has a tendency when it’s plastic, when it’s mixed up and it’s
malleable, it won’t support itself very much. So what do you do to
hold it up?… It’s a discovery…it’s not just an exercise.”
How Soft Slab Works
Begin with rolled-out, flat, and wet or moist pieces of clay (you
can roll them out by hand-tossing or using a rolling pin or slab
roller). Soft slab naturally warps and bends during the making and
firing, so roll out the slabs on each side repeatedly. Stack with a
smooth and wrinkle-free material in between each slab to prevent
any tearing or distortion. Then cut each individual piece into
shapes, and connect or form them into an object. Score and slip
the joined areas to ensure the object will dry out without losing its
form.
How Hard Slab Works
Use only dried and firm slabs of clay for this technique. Once the
clay is leather-hard, cut out your pieces and join them by scoring
and slipping. This technique offers less warpage than soft slab
construction.

Coil Construction

Left: Jomon Vessel (3000-2000 B.C.E.) on view at Tokyo National Museum, Tokyo, Japan. Right: Kristina
Riska, Animal (2014). Image courtesy of Hostler Burrows, New York.
Hunter-gatherers of the Jōmon period (ca. 10,500–300 B.C.) in
Neolithic Japan built pots using the coil construction technique. In
fact, the word “jōmon” derives from “cord markings,” a term that
describes layers of soft, coiled clay. As Jōmon ceramics are some
of the earliest-known examples of pottery in the world, scientists
believe the Japanese were influenced by Chinese techniques, since
the Chinese originated the world’s very first pots. Jōmon women
would undertake the laborious task of mixing the clay, creating the
coiled pots, and firing them in an outdoor bonfire. The style of
Jōmon pottery was incredibly diverse and evolved considerably
across some 10,200 years. The earliest vessels were low-fired and
simplistic with small bases that were either pointed or flat. They
were used for boiling water. But as the kiln evolved, enabling pots
to be fired at higher temperatures, ceramics grew more intricate,
with ornate decoration on the rims of vessels used for ceremonial
purposes.
Finnish artist 
Kristina Riska
’s work recalls the craftsmanship and artistry of Jōmon pottery.
She employs the ancient process of coiling and achieves the same
duality between an object’s functionality and decorative purpose.
Like the ceremonial vessels of the Jōmon period, Animal (2014)
appears both strong and delicate. Instead of relying on a mould or
the force of a wheel, coiling (as with slab-built ceramics) requires
only the artist’s steady hand to shape the vessel’s form. As much
of Riska’s work is large-scale (some objects reach as high as eight
feet), the long and meticulous process of creating it would seem
painstaking, but the artist finds it meditative. “The process is very
slow and it takes weeks to finish the piece,” she says. “The quiet
hours of building are what I enjoy the most. Silent days in the
ateljee, the view from the window every day different, changing
seasons from winter to summer—day after day.”
How it Works
Use your fingers to roll out soft clay into long, thick strips about ¼
– ½ inches wide (think: long, thick pasta noodles), and smooth out
a plate of clay. This will be the base on which the coils will be
stacked. After layering the coils one on top of the other, ensure
that they are joined securely by scoring and slipping them
together.

Wheel Throwing / Hand Throwing

Left: Sotades Painter, Red-Figure Rhyton (c. 450 B.C.E.). Image courtesy of Walters Art Museum. Right: The Haas
Brothers, Unique, Hand-thrown Clay-Z Accretion in Hulk Glaze (2015). Image courtesy of R & Company, New
York.

The potter’s wheel, often referred to as the process of “throwing,”

was invented around 3,500 B.C. in Mesopotamia in modern-day
Iraq, and it remains one of the most significant inventions of all
time. The wheel’s centrifugal force allowed potters to create
vessels with unmatched speed and quality, enabling the formation
of thinner and more refined vessels than was previously possible
with handbuilding techniques. The invention of the wheel is
largely accountable for the more than 100,000 vessels that survive
from 
ancient Greece
. The complex wheel-throwing process used to create the famous
Greek red-figure/black-figure vessels often demanded two or more
sessions of firing. The objects were painted with a slip before the
third firing—usually with scenes of war, agriculture, and
ceremony, or abstract, geometric designs.
Welch points out the potential for innovation that the wheel
ushered in. “In the 1950s, the wheel was seen as the source of the
greatest freedom, but that was probably linked to its view as a
device to churn out pots,” says Welch. “So using it to
[experiment] was all the more glorious.” 
The Haas Brothers
 continue to utilize the wheel to create forms that elicit the
curiosities of sexuality, psychedelia, intimacy, and nature—and to
comment on contemporary culture as a whole. Strange, quirky,
lush, and erotic, the objects created by the L.A.-based twins
manifest a wide range of sensations, materials, and techniques. It’s
their “Unique, Hand-thrown” works particularly, however, that
convey a certain timelessness, suggesting methods of the past.
How it Works
Drop a kneaded ball of clay with some force onto the center of the
wheel head. With a bowl of water, wet hands and clay as the
wheel spins quickly. Cup clay in your hands and use your legs and
core to keep your body steady and to provide extra strength in
order to bring it into a tower shape. Pushing the clay down and in
simultaneously with the palms of your hands, let extra clay and
water disperse from the shape being formed. Keep the clay
centered for an even rotation and appearance. Use one hand to
find the center of the ball and open it with your fingers as the
other hand holds it intact. Once the bottom is compressed, the
walls are raised, thinned, and shaped as much as you like, and the
top is evened out, let finish and dry.

Slip Casting

Left: Anonymous (China), Camel (7th century). Image courtesy of Walters Art Museum. Right: Minsoo
Lee, +,-, (2013). Image courtesy of Gallery LVS, Seoul. 

The China wares you might see displayed behind glass in your
grandmother’s dining room originate from the golden age of
China’s 
Tang Dynasty
 (618–907). Around 19,000 years after the first ceramic vessels
from Xianrendong Cave, the Tang developed and perfected the
manufacture of porcelain. Trade by sea and along the Silk Road
enabled the exchange of goods with India and the Middle East,
and may have led to the discovery of new chemical compounds
for the invention of three-colored glazes. With a precise and
controlled casting technique and the development of green, amber,
yellow, and blue glazes, the Chinese created delicate, fine-bodied
porcelain wares that elevated pottery to a sophisticated class of
artistry. The 7th-century, double-humped Camel, made by an
anonymous artist, has a streaked glaze effect produced during
firing. The detail is the result of a Sancai (“three-color”) glaze that
is believed to have been used for burial purposes.
South Korean artist 
Minsoo Lee
 produces gorgeously precise, minimalist, and functional wares
that draw from the porcelain tradition. Blue-and-white vessels
with perfectly aligning geometric accents along each rim, they
satisfy the brain like the moment after solving a puzzle. Lee aims
to modernize traditional practices and he did so with +,– (2013)
by applying multiple layers of porcelain slip one at a time (until
each is semi-dry) into a mould on a spinning wheel. Welch says
that slip casting is the best approach when “making multiple
molds, which allows for numerous sets to be created in short
order.” Although slip casting may seem like the most mechanical
and restrained of the traditional techniques, Welch points to artists
whose works contradict this assumption. “A few years ago I
would have said slip casting seems the most limiting process and
likely the least free,” he says, “but the work of Mathew
McConnell subverts that idea. His work using a combination of
casting and press moulding is, in my eyes, completely original…
it’s rather spectacular actually.”
How it Works
Pour liquid clay (the slip) into a securely fastened plaster mould.
After a few minutes, allow the clay to form and solidify within the
mould’s interior wall, and then pour out any remaining liquid clay.
After a few more minutes, remove the hardened clay from the
mould, trim unwanted areas if necessary, and air-dry.