So...
Third phase of the Bronze age in ancient Mesopotamia, in the area of Iraq and Ur, it is believed the wheel came to be. It appears to have been created in ancient China as well roughly the same time... 5000 BCE.
Or...
Khnum, the third aspect of the Egyptian God RA, the god who is the source of the nile, created humans on the wheel. Though it was said Thoth, the god of wisdom, actually brought the wheel to humans.
Anyway. I am not teaching throwing. I just don't throw well enough. Now, I know I am good at teaching. This is one of my skills... so... I have a student. That I am not teaching to throw...
She knows she needs to get into a class with someone else that throws much better than me but in the meantime... I can help.
So. When you learn guitar, chords not notes (though you can do notes this way as well), you learn to play a song. You play and play and play it until it sounds like music. then you pick a harder song. In the process you learn some basic guitar skills. This is similar to how I learned to throw. It was exploration, a bit "Montessori" in style. This works ok when you are alone, but you never become a great well rounded guitar player. This works great with a teacher, who can find the "right" songs that make sure you learn all the basic skills.
But, when you learn piano and most woodwind and brass instruments... you learn scales. Scales are not music. Scales suck. Etudes are basically a musical genre where great composers were working with scales but created music out of it so scales would not suck. Now we listen to this at concerts. Anyway, scales teach you the notes, you practice the skill... so when you do the real thing it is there. This is also a martial arts practice the same movement repetitively approach.
I am showing how to do "scales" I have Robin Hopper to thank in part.
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Breaking down the basic set of primary skills requires 6 or 7 1# balls of clay for each exercise. If you burn through this, increase the number of clay balls.
*Learn to center. Practice this on all balls. We are not making anything. Only center till the clay fatigues, then move on to the next ball
*watch youtube and find three different methods to center.
*practice centering with these methods, see what "feels right". Still not making anything.
*Learn to open, three methods. Now we center, open and create a bottom and try a first pull. claw, knuckle and finger lift. We are not making anything.
*Learn to pull and compress the rim. Only using three lifts, no more are allowed. Skill practice is center, open, create the bottom, lift and compress the rim. We are now create straight cylinders. We cut them off so now we are going to learn to clean up the bottom.
*Pull it all together. Repeat last lesson, you are allowed to do as many pulls as you want. Focus is on each skill step by step but also look for the "feel" of "right". Centered has a feel, a good pull has a feel, stable clay has a feel. No bats allowed. Clean bottom, cut and lift onto ware board.
*now we make cylinders, and you can adjust the form. Each should look a little different. Learning how to "shape" as a different process from a lift/pull. Learn to use the rib to clean the outside and compress. Judge what you like and don't like of your final product.
*get 10oz, 1#, 1.5#, 2#, 2.5# balls of clay. Create straight cylinders. Move from smallest to largest. goal is to practice each skill and to create cylinders that are in height and width proportion to one another. Again, no bats, lift it off.
We then can move to making a round of... and work on repetition with same weight and move back to the proportion exercise with each desired form.
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