Adelaide Alsop Robineau famously took a long time carving her scarab vase. Although carving on the surface of pots can be time consuming, people do not need to be as determined as she was. She even came up with a successful porcelain paste in order to fix cracks in her scarab vase, while she was taking over a thousand hours to carve it.
Not all carving needs to be representational or even complex, but the first video shows some interesting tips for carving in that way. When I was studying ceramics, I used a pencil, and sometimes a pen to carve lines into the clay. However, I went very slowly, brushing and blowing away the clay displaced by my writing instruments. Below is one of my carved bowls.
Then there is another video on carving with all the same size lines that still manages to look elegant and skillful. If you would like to read more about Adelaide Alsop Robineau just go to ‘Home’ on the menu above and find the blog post labeled ‘An Interesting Historical Figure in Ceramics’, or look to the right under ‘Recent Posts’ to find the same title.
