Mie Kongo

This course takes students on a journey through the changing landscape of ceramic art, design, and production. Recent advances in rapid prototyping technologies provide designers and artists with more direct means for transforming concepts into physical form. In this course, students explore various ways to apply advanced technologies to ceramic design and production. Students will acquire basic skills in clay modeling methods, plaster mold making, slip casting, 3D Scanning, digital modeling, and digital output methods including 3D Printing and Laser Cutting. Basic knowledge for Rhino and/or other 3D modeling software is required. The technologies and methods for ceramic production have been developing over the course of thousands of years, often linked to specific material/cultural histories. Digital tools afford makers the ability to create, manipulate, distort, and ideate without the constraints of the ceramic process. Through slide lecture, readings, group discussions, demonstrations, and self directed projects, we will consider ceramic production methods of the past and how they influence contemporary art and design practices. In this course we will ask the questions: What are the benefits and the challenges of using ceramic materials? How can we use digital tools to assist in the ideation, prototyping, and the production of ceramic objects? How can we use ceramic materials to assist in the ideation, prototyping, and production of digital objects? What is the interplay between the digital object and the ceramic object?

This course takes students on a journey through the changing landscape of ceramic art, design, and production. Recent advances in rapid prototyping technologies provide designers and artists with more direct means for transforming concepts into physical form. In this course, students explore various ways to apply advanced technologies to ceramic design and production. Students will acquire basic skills in clay modeling methods, plaster mold making, slip casting, 3D Scanning, digital modeling, and digital output methods including 3D Printing and Laser Cutting. Basic knowledge for Rhino and/or other 3D modeling software is required. The technologies and methods for ceramic production have been developing over the course of thousands of years, often linked to specific material/cultural histories. Digital tools afford makers the ability to create, manipulate, distort, and ideate without the constraints of the ceramic process. Through slide lecture, readings, group discussions, demonstrations, and self directed projects, we will consider ceramic production methods of the past and how they influence contemporary art and design practices. In this course we will ask the questions: What are the benefits and the challenges of using ceramic materials? How can we use digital tools to assist in the ideation, prototyping, and the production of ceramic objects? How can we use ceramic materials to assist in the ideation, prototyping, and production of digital objects? What is the interplay between the digital object and the ceramic object?

This technical studies course will explore glaze materials, the geology of ceramic materials, ceramic chemistry, glaze and clay body formulation, glaze colors, the function of heat, firing atmosphere, and glaze characteristics, behaviors and defects. The spectrum of raw ceramic materials become familiar to students through weekly lectures and discussions, numerous experimental glaze material tests and data recording and analysis.

Students will learn how to safely use and exploit a wide variety of ceramic materials in order to develop a broader understanding of applications for personal expression. We will explore a wide range of glaze formulations while building a comprehensive foundation for understanding how materials can be used and formulated to yield specific and reproducible results. At the conclusion of this course, each individual will have the tools to precisely test and produce glaze formulations, understand how to use the various tools present in the glaze lab, and the ability to interpret written and fired formulae results.

This class is designed as a half lecture and half lab course. Course work includes weekly reading, 10 glaze test assignments, mid-term and final quizzes and final critique.