Kids Sculpting with Clay

In addition to all of the clay vessels we make at camp, the cups, bowls, trays, dishes, pitchers and so forth, another fun part of the Rockbrook ceramics program is making sculpture. This means using the same hand building techniques, and even wheel-thrown pottery techniques, and combining pieces to build three-dimensional objects.

One important technique to learn for clay sculpting is using something called “slip.” Slip is a form of liquid clay, or a runny mixture of clay and water. It can be used a number of ways, but when building a clay sculpture, slip is applied to join two pieces of wet clay together. For example, you might want to connect a coil to a slab, or a dome shape to something turned on the potter’s wheel. The slip acts as a sort of glue helping the pieces stick together.

So what kinds of things can you sculpt out of clay? Anything your imagination might dream up! Recently at camp we’ve seen some great representational figures— fish, horses (of course!), turtles, snakes, and other animals. The campers have also made amazing human forms like faces and hands. Natural objects like leaves, ferns and branches make great textures to be incorporated as well. Need some other ideas? Here’s a great web site with links to amazing examples of sculptural ceramics.

Seeing what the Rockbrook girls are sculpting in our pottery classes, it’s easy to be amazed, and to understand why this arts and crafts activity is so popular at camp.

Dude, Do you Extrude?

One of the ceramics hand-building techniques we teach in Rockbrook pottery classes is extruding. This involves creating clay forms, or consistent shapes, by pressing clay through an extruder, a simple hand-powered machine. An extruder is really a piston of sorts operated by a lever. On one end of the piston’s cylinder is a wooden or metal plate called a die. Different dies have different shapes cut out of them. The whole thing works by filling the cylinder with clay, and pulling the lever of the extruder, thereby forcing the piston to push the clay through the die, and out in the shape of the cutout. It takes muscles to pull that lever, but it’s so cool to see the extruded clay come out!

Some dies extrude circular tubes, but there are also square, hexagonal and octagonal tubes as well. You can extrude slabs, coils and even half-spherical shapes. Extruders are great at making long, even forms of clay.

Of course, these shapes then can become the building blocks for more complex hand-building projects. Extruded clay can be combined to make really complex sculptures, for example when extruded tubes are cut at different angles and joined to make multi-sided vessels.

And don’t forget glazing and firing these pieces. Like all the pottery and ceramics projects at camp, the results are beautiful! Yep, at Rockbrook, we do extrude.

Kids Learning Ceramics

Coming to one of Rockbrook’s camp sessions is a wonderful opportunity for kids to learn about ceramics. Instead of just “painting pottery,” where you apply glazes to pre-formed ceramic pieces, we start with real clay. It’s really one of the most satisfying parts— to start with a lump of what’s essentially soft, smooth mud, and learn how to change it into something beautiful and useful.

There are lots of ways to do that too. You might simply pinch and press the the clay to form a cup, for example, or you might first roll the clay into a long, snake-like coil which can then be stacked to make a dish of some sort. It’s a little more advanced technique, but you can also center a ball of clay on a spinning platter (“the wheel”), and shape it into a symmetrical bowl or cup. This is sometimes referred to as “throwing a pot on the wheel.” It’s almost magical to see. From the lump of clay, you carefully pull up the sides of a beautiful vessel.

These building techniques are just the beginning of what kids learn about ceramics while at camp. They also understand the complete process of drying what they make, glazing their pieces, and ultimately the finished results after firing everything in a kiln. Every summer ceramics is a hugely popular activity with the kids at Rockbrook. When you see what they learn, what they end up making, and how much fun they have doing it, you can see why!

Kayakers, Potters & Sharp Shooters

The riflery instructor Paige has been announcing a lot of names lately of girls joining the “Bullseye Club.” Being able to shoot a bullseye in riflery is not easy. It really does take a great deal of practice to learn how to sight the rifles and remain steady while shooting. Each rifle can have its own quirks to consider as well. That’s why the girls will tell you about their favorite gun, all of which, by the way, have names like Othello, Captain Jack, and the Fresh Prince.

In pottery, Katie and Will, our dynamic lead ceramics instructors, are inspiring the campers to create some really cool pieces. In addition to simple tiles pressed with nature patterns, they’ve been making mugs from clay slabs, adding complex designs, a handle, and colorful glazes. We’ve also seen amazing sculptures of animals and trees, and plenty of pots being thrown on the wheel. We’re beginning to fire all of this session’s pieces in the kilns, so it won’t be long before we can see how all the pottery turns out.

Today was also a day of tie dyeing in “Hodge Podge.” This happens about once a week around here. We bring out the gloves, rubber bands, and squirt bottles of dye, and pre-soak the shirts in a mild solution of urea (which helps dissolve more dye in water and keep the shirts wet longer). Armed with multiple colors of dye, the girls love twisting, tying, and folding the shirts. You’ll be amazed when you see how they turn out.

The kitchen treated us to “International Day” today, with each meal inspired by a different ethnic cuisine. Breakfast was probably the most unusual— a traditional Tico (Costa Rican) breakfast of scrambled eggs, black beans and rice, sliced avocado, slabs of mild white cheese, salsa and fresh berries. For lunch, we switched to Mediterranean food and had homemade hummus, falafel, pita bread, olives, feta cheese, tomato and cucumber salad. And at dinner, out came steak fajitas (with grilled onions and peppers), beans, tortillas, fresh guacamole, chips, cheese and salsa. This was a great day to eat at camp!

Clyde, Kelsey and Tara took an advanced kayaking trip to the Nantahala river today as well. They packed a lunch and headed to the river for the whole day with a small group of seniors. The Nantahala has a few technical rapids but also a several gentler sections making the trip a nice mix of action and time to talk. Clyde is great about telling girls about the river and coaching them as they approach each rapid. Back at camp, the girls were excited to report clean runs through the last big rapid, the Nantahala Falls, with only one swimmer at the very end. That’s a great accomplishment!

Adventure and Ceramics

Early this morning, Clyde, Mallory and Lexie took a rock climbing trip over to the south side of Looking Glass Rock. This is probably the most famous rock climbing area in the southeast, a beautiful dome of gray and white granite popping out of the forest. There are several hundred climbing routes to choose from, including face climbs, crack climbs and even overhangs of varying difficulty. Some of the routes were first climbed back in the early 1970s, and now are considered “classic” by most climbers. Having all this variety is fortunate given the popularity of this area. Still, if there is a particular climb you have in mind, it pays to get out to the rock early. Our group pulled out of camp around 7:30am and since Clyde has more than 20 years experience climbing on Looking Glass, he was able to set up six different climbs. Some were a little more difficult than others, but all the girls were able to try all six. What a day of climbing!

Ah, lunch was another great surprise. This time it was shrimp Po-Boy sandwiches, homemade coleslaw, kettle chips and cut melon. With the regular salad bar stocked, we could add a little green to the plates as well. Rick’s homemade meals make it so easy to eat well at camp.

Over in the ceramics studios, we’re starting to see lots of colorful creations coming out of the kilns. This is exciting for the girls because there are so many steps leading up to their projects being completed… building the piece (hand or wheel-thrown), drying, bisque firing, glazing and then the high-temperature final kiln firing. Plus, it’s only at this last step that the glaze colors shine through. As you can see from this photo, the girls have been working on sculpting things— flowers, trees, bugs and so forth. I’ve also seen plenty of soap dishes, vases and bowls coming out of the kiln. Really cool stuff, for sure.

Saturday Games

The pottery studios are really hopping this session. When the girls are signing up for their activity schedules, pottery is so popular in fact, it tends to fill up the fastest, though archery, riflery and the Alpine Tower are right in there too. I think that’s because the girls are making really cool stuff in there: cups, bowls, sculptures, whistles, tiles, dishes, etc. It’s particularly exciting to see their faces when they throw their first pot on the wheel. It’s a little tricky to learn throwing on the wheel, and it can be frustrating at first, but with some tips from the instructors and practice, most girls figure it out. We finished firing a kiln full of pieces the other day, and everything looks awesome! Don’t be surprised to see some wonderfully colored, handmade pottery coming home with your camper.

After our morning of regular camp activities, and a classic lunch of hot dogs, baked beans and all the fixings, (oh, and let’s not forget rest hour!) the whole camp played a giant game of “Minute to Win It.” We took aspects of the popular TV game show and “campified” them to create a series of silly physical challenges. Each cabin group then competed in their lodges with the big finale in the gym. The games included, juggling balloons, stacking candy bars on your partner’s forehead, eating an oreo placed on your forehead (no hands!), and rolling an egg without touching it by fanning it with a piece of cardboard. You can imagine how funny these games are to watch, and how much fun they are to play with your friends.

There’s a long tradition at Rockbrook of something called the “Biltmore Train.” Year’s ago, the Biltmore Estate in Asheville ran a commercial dairy farm and sold dairy products to the local communities. This included a special ice cream truck that would make house calls, and in our case “camp calls.” Once a session, it would pull into camp and serve the girls almost unlimited (!) ice cream cones. Since the truck was decorated like a train, perhaps a reference to George Vanderbilt’s family business, our campers called it the “Biltmore Train.” Now that the Biltmore dairy has been closed (and replaced with a winery), we have our own ice cream cone extravaganza… buckets of ice cream, stacks of cones, and the girls going back for more, sometimes two, three or four times!  It’s a little decadent, but for all these girls, a once-a-year special treat.

Kids Making Pottery

Here is a glimpse into one of Rockbrook’s two pottery studios, the one we call call “Upper Clay.” The other one is called— surprise! —”Lower Clay.”  With plenty of tables and benches, pottery making equipment (potter’s wheels, a slab roller, extruder, and hand tools, for example), loads of natural light, these are really fun places for kids to spend time making pottery projects.  There are always counselors and other pottery instructors buzzing about, and of course, great conversation to keep it all going.

If you look closely in the photo (click it to see a larger version), you can see some of the very cool pottery projects the camps kids are making… plaques, vases, cups, and bowls, to name a few.  Just think of all the gifts you’ll have for people when camp is done!

Summer Pottery Program

The Rockbrook pottery program continues to be a very popular activity at camp.  Both  pottery studios always seem to be humming— girls sculpting, pressing or decorating something, and instructors zipping around to give pointers, prepare materials, or plan a kiln firing. All this action means that there are some pretty cool things being made too! There are multi-colored tiles, sculpted miniature animals, giant coil pots (like the one in this photo), and delicate wheel-thrown cups and bowls.

One really cool project is to take a smooth flat slab of clay and press natural forms into it so that they leave intricate textures. Little twigs, leaves, and tree bark, for example, all leave amazing patterns. You can then use the slab to make a vase or some other vessel.

It’s easy to see why the Rockbrook summer pottery program is so well loved.  There’s almost an endless variety of pottery projects to make, great satisfaction seeing how they turn out when glazed and fired, and the fun of being with your friends throughout.