This comprehensive guide covers the materials, tools, methods, and techniques for making original ceramic pieces in a wide range of forms. From hand sculpting to pinching, wheel throwing to slip casting, here you’ll find easy-to-follow instructions accompanied by beautiful photographs to make the world of ceramics clear and exciting. Readers will also learn about glazes, firing techniques, decorating tips, and much more.

A lucrative trade in Athenian pottery flourished from the early sixth until the late fifth century B.C.E., finding an eager market in Etruria. Most studies of these painted vases focus on the artistry and worldview of the Greeks who made them, but Sheramy D. Bundrick shifts attention to their Etruscan customers, ancient trade networks, and archaeological contexts. Thousands of Greek painted vases have emerged from excavations of... more...

Mosaic is a colorful, ever-changing art form that appeals to a wide range of artists. When mosaic art is combined with environmental awareness, the results are particularly stunning, as non-conventional items such as handles salvaged from broken dressers and broken chips of antique china can be incorporated into unique, environmentally friendly pique assiette mosaic projects. Mosaic - The Art of Reusing features 25 projects that are vivid, vibrant, and... more...

Dishes is the dish obsessive’s dream come true―a definitive guide to the colorful, wonderful dinner plate, with hundreds of patterns organized thematically and annotated with historical details and charming anecdotes that span centuries and continents. The book is chock-full of everything a dish lover could hope for, including more than 600 of history’s most stunning plates; profiles of iconic manufacturers like... more...

For over 25,000 years, humans across the globe have shaped, decorated, and fired clay. Despite great differences in location and time, universal themes appear in the world's ceramic traditions, including religious influences, human and animal representations, and mortuary pottery. In Global Clay: Themes in World Ceramic Traditions, noted pottery scholar John A. Burrison explores the recurring artistic themes that tie humanity together,... more...

The intricate designs and complex patterns of Cherokee pottery have been developed over centuries. Both timeless and time-honored, these singular works of pottery are still crafted by the proud hands of Cherokee women in Western North Carolina. Cherokee Pottery recounts the history of a tradition passed from elder to child through countless generations. Anna Fariello, associate professor at Western Carolina University, explores the method and meaning... more...

The most pervasive gods in ancient Rome had no traditional mythology attached to them, nor was their worship organized by elites. Throughout the Roman world, neighborhood street corners, farm boundaries, and household hearths featured small shrines to the beloved lares, a pair of cheerful little dancing gods. These shrines were maintained primarily by ordinary Romans, and often by slaves and freedmen, for whom the lares cult provided a... more...

With over 800 unique photographs, this Chinese arts book is a feast for the eyes. Produced exclusively for wealthy Chinese communities along the Strait of Malacca in the 19th and early 20th centuries, Peranakan Chinese porcelain is enjoying a resurgence of interest among collectors. Straits-born Chinese, or Peranakan, in Penang, Malacca and Singapore, used this ornate and colorful enamelware on festive occasions such as weddings, birthdays,... more...

This beautiful modern volume presents the work of 30 contemporary artists who have turned to clay to shape their most innovative ideas into stunning works of art. From cups shaped like crystals to a tree trunk made of porcelain and stoneware planters painted to look like ladies, popular curator and blogger Kate Singleton collects here whimsical pieces with narrative, graphic, curious, and organic qualities that blur the line between fine art, design,... more...

Blue and White: Early Japanese Export Ware, as an exhibition and publication, is of special interest as it permits comparisons between blue and white wares of similar design from the Orient and Europe, and calls attention to the vital function of the European maritime nations, particularly Portugal and Holland, in the transmission of aesthetic concepts between East and West. Clear examples of cross-cultural aesthetic exchanges are... more...