Throwing and turning ware are fascinating techniques and look easy, but they're deceptive.The potter's craft requires lots of practice.

Ai left and above, practiced professional craftsmen turn out famed Wedgwood ware in Great Britain.

Much of the glamour of the potter's craft is associated with the wheel Undoubtedly, the making of a model by throwing and turning on a wheel is the most fascinating of methods for making pottery.Faster, more precise methods have replaced the wheel in the modern commercial ceramics factory, but the an­cient tool has remained as an important implement for the artist-potter.

Throwing is the technique of building a ware with the aid of the spinning of the wheel.Turning refers to the finishing and smoothing of the ware with tools after the clay has dried to a leather-hard stage.Since the clay must harden before it can be turned, it is not possible to finish a piece in one sitting.

It is extremely difficult to describe these operations.This is probably the reason why so little has been written about the tech­niques of throwing and turning.And no matter how much instruction you read, you will not master the use of the wheel except by watching an experienced potter at work and then practicing on your own wheel for many hours.There are, for example, a thousand and one little tricks in the posi­tion of the arms, hands, thumbs and fingers which are impossible to describe but which can easily be learned by watch­ing an expert throw and turn.

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