“Figure Study”
Unfired clay
14” x 14” x 14”
2025
I am back at my little studio in a corner of a ceramic factory in northern Thailand. This is my 3rd trip here and this time I actually have a little shelter and lights. So I can work at night.
My goal upon arrival was to squeeze out a bunch of figure studies that have been in my mind for awhile. And this time I was determined to leave them in a raw condition rather than trying to smooth them out and define details.
The clay here is in 2 distinct conditions. When it is first plugged it is light and frothy. It is actually very much like premixed cake frosting. It has very little compression strength and very little tinsel strength. That means t easily collapses under its own weight and will not hold up anything sticking out like an arm or even a head if it is tilted even a little.
Its 2 virtues are that it is very easy to manipulate and it is very sticky. So, it is a perfect 3 dimensional sketching material for small studies.
And that is what this piece is made of. I am not sure how well it will fire. It is quite fragile and may simply be reduced to rubble in the kiln. What you see featured here is a photograph of this piece shortly after I created it. If there is anything worth photographing after the firing I will add it here.
By the way, pugging is a process of squeezing water out of clay and in the process reducing it to a consistent and ideally smooth substance. This is done with a primitive tool that looks like a large soft ice cream dispenser. A large cylindrical screw pushes the wet clay through a tube and extrudes a never ending flow of soft clay that looks like a giant turd. Usually someone cuts of the “turd” in consistent lengths and sets them aside. Then, these “turd” are fed back into the pug machine hopper to be plugged a second time for a firmer and sturdier clay body suitable for making large pots … and sculptures.