Appropriation in clay

Overview: Students will use basic slab building techniques to create a lidded vessel that is meant to house a specific, predetermined food product. Students will be asked to study graphic design and labels that are associated with their product and incorporate or appropriate elements into their design using slips, engobes and various surface techniques.

The goal of this lesson is to incorporate Olivia Gude's idea of appropriation, while reference historical pottery and vessel that serve specific functions in the creation of a lidded vessel.

By studying the labels we associate with products and asking students to include them in their personal design, we can bring the fundamental elements and principles of design that we around surrounded by in our daily lives to attention.

Objectives:
Students will be able to use basic ceramic technique of building with slabs.
Students will undertand the
Students will reflect on art and design that surrounds us in our consumeristic society.
students will research historical ceramics and functional ware.


"If one grows up in a world filled with cheap, disposable images, these easily become the stuff out of which one makes one’s own creative expression."


The following is a list of Ancient greek pottery containers and what was intended for:


These included vases, jugs, and bowls in all sizes including miniature perfume containers, as well as a range of other vessels with formal functions, such as the small lekythoi used as grave markers.

Alabastron
A small storage container for perfume, it had a wide mouth and a short narrow neck.

Amphora
A tall jug with two handles and a narrow neck. Amphorae were used to store wine or oil.

Aryballos
A small container used to store oil, it had a spherical body a short neck and a wide mouth.

Hydria
A water jar with two horizontal carrying handles. Most hydriai also had a third attached at the back for pouring.

Krater (crater)
Commonly used for diluting wine with water, a krater was a large vessel with a broad body and base and usually a wide mouth. Handles were attached either near the base or on its shoulders. Differing types included: the column krater, the bell krater, the volute crater, and the calyx krater.

Lekythos
Commonly used to store unguents or oils. Lekythoi were often used as funerary vessels.

Loutrophoros
A tall jar for weddings and funerals, with a long slender neck and flaring mouth. Loutrophoroi in the black-figure style were usually funerary vessels.

Oinochoe
A wine pitcher.

Olpe
A jug used to carry water or wine.

Pelike
Similar to the amphora, Pelikai were containers for liquids like wine and oil and were made during the Red-figure period.

Psykter
Used as a wine cooler with a broad body, a cylindrical stem, and a short neck. Later psykters had handles attached to their shoulders.

Pyxis
A container with a lid commonly used to hold jewellery or cosmetics.

Stamnos
A red-figure storage jar with a short neck, a flat rim, and a straight body tapering to a base. Most stamnoi had handles fitted to their widest part.