At a remote station north of Broken Hill, potters collect from close by and far before a weekend of primitive shooting.
For about 30 years, station owner and Potter Cynthia Langford have opened the gates to welcome potters to do four different types of fired.
‘We have our sawdust fires … You get a beautiful black, very polished pot that comes out of it and they are always very enthusiastic about it, “she says.
“Then we have our well where we put our pots in the well with coffee grounds and various salted corn peels and things, and we get beautiful colors on our pots.
“And then we have our cow pocket that we do in a drum with dry cow layers.“
Homemade bin ovens are a much more affordable option. ((ABC Broken Hill: Katherine Spackman))
The potters spend most of the day firing pots in bins of the broken hills made in 2012 during a workshop with the Swedish Potter Stefan Jakob.
“We had a workshop in which we made an IKEA waste bin in a small oven and our members bring their small oven out and we collect all their small sticks and pieces of wood and we fire our pots in the waste bins,” says Mrs. Langford.
Nicki Murnane van Adelaide adds wood to the homemade bin oven that is used for Raku Pottery. ((ABC Broken Hill: Katherine Spackman))
Friendship formed by earthenware
Participating in the Broken Hill Group are five members of the Adelaide Potters Club.
Since 2012, Potters From The Club have been traveling for six hours every year to come to the remote station.
“They were just very enthusiastic to come and do us to do this and to be able to do these primitive fires,” says Mrs. Langford.
Cynthia Langford from Purnamoota Station organizes primitive pottery fires on its property every year. ((ABC Broken Hill: Katherine Spackman))
Adelaide ceramist Frances Rogers lives for the first time to shoot and says she loves the simple color cape.
“I really find it inspiring for the pots – as you look and you go:” Ok, I’ll use Copper Red today, because that’s what I’m looking at, “she says.
Adelaide’s Frances Rogers made her Raku creation during the primitive earthenware fire event. ((ABC Broken Hill: Katherine Spackman))
Personal trainer Nicki Murnane returns to Purnamoota for the second time and says it is a great weekend to return to nature and meet lovely people.
“I always tell people it is a childish weekend,” she says.
Nicki Murnane has been to the primitive earthenware fires twice on the external outback station. ((ABC Broken Hill: Katherine Spackman))
“The expectation you get as a child on Christmas Eve, that’s what you get here, and you don’t really get that much more in life.
“[It’s] The pure joy of unraveling and opening open and not knowing what you will get. “
Pots are draped with corn neck, beetroot, coffee grounds and wire before they go into the fireplace. ((ABC Broken Hill: Katherine Spackman))
More accessible pottery
A highlight for the visitors are the Raku shooting in metal trays that bring the broken hills of their houses.
Raku Pottery is a Japanese shooting technique that produces distinctive markings on the surface of the ceramics.
The broken hills burn EMU springs or horsehair on their pots during the weekend event.
“You open the lid and you put a little sugar on it and when the sugar burns black when it touches the pot, the pots are ready to come out and let feathers do,” says Broken Hill Potters Society President Sue Andrews.
As part of a Raku Schiet, a broken hill pot emu springs on a pot. ((ABC Broken Hill: Katherine Spackman))
The other Raku technique that they use means that a raku glaze is laid on pots and to get it on temperature before it is quickly removed to place it in another container to reduce the glaze and give different colors.
Adelaide ceramist Frances Rogers says it is a wonderful collective activity.
“You need all the hands on deck … pull the pot out and fall into the hot barrel and someone’s paper and the other has the wet paper and you know, everyone is like ‘get the lid’, so it’s a bit more adrenaline,” she says.
Rogers says that the pottery makes more affordable and more accessible.
“[Proper kilns] Become $ 4,000. They just told us that we could hit one of these for around $ 400 or $ 450, “she says.
Unpredictable and spontaneous results
The potters pack their pots with cow layers to create unique patterns. ((ABC Broken Hill: Katherine Spackman))
Lee Quinn van Broken Hill has been a potter for 40 years.
She enjoys the process of making the cow cat.
While the pots were removed on Sunday morning, Mrs. Andrews says that this is the best cow cat they have had.
“It’s just the colors – normally it doesn’t work out so well. I think it was more pots in the cow’s knock, tightly packed in a smaller drum,” she says.
Sue Andrews says that this year the Koespat on a remote station was the best they have ever had. ((ABC Broken Hill: Katherine Spackman))
Waiting list for broken Hill Pottery Classes
Participation in this weekend was New Potter and firefighter Jack Simmonds, who managed to get to the Broken Hill Potter Society after a waiting time from the Broken Hill Potters Society.
“I probably did a sip and clay night in 2021 and put my name for lessons and then I received the call at the end of last year and they said there is a place for you on Tuesday morning and I called my boss and got on Tuesday morning,” he says.
Jack Simmonds van Broken Hill has fought his first earthenware well. ((ABC Broken Hill: Katherine Spackman))
Mrs Langford, who first came to the Potters in 1991, says that the Broken Hill Potters Society was founded in the mid -1970s by three or four women.
They sold pots and eventually saw money to buy an oven together and officially formed a society.
After a while they bought an old Scout Hall and raise money every year via Mother’s Day and Christmas fairs to make the money to pay the rates.
The Broken Hill Potters Society follows weekly lessons that learns earthenware skills. ((ABC Broken Hill: Katherine Spackman))
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