Loading…
31
A retired teacher at the Tucson Museum of Art showed me how to hold a 2,000 year old pot sherd
Last month I took my kids to the Tucson Museum of Art and ended up in a small room where a retired teacher named Walt was handling a box of Hohokam pottery pieces. He pulled out one plain brown sherd about the size of a Ritz cracker and showed me you support it from underneath with your palm flat, no fingers on the surface. He mentioned it came from a site near the Santa Cruz River where they found over 3,000 pieces in one pit house. I never thought about how much grip pressure matters until he pointed out the oils on your fingers can actually speed up erosion on old clay. Do any of you who have worked with museum collections have rules for handling pieces without gloves?
2 comments
Log in to join the discussion
Log In2 Comments
haydenp951mo ago
Did Walt say why they skip gloves for pottery specifically? Curious if it's a grip thing or if gloves actually do more harm on rough surfaces.
3
spencer_sanchez671mo ago
The grip thing makes sense but it's probably more about feel than grip. With gloves on you can't feel small bumps or thickness changes in the clay, so you end up pressing too hard or missing spots that need work. Rough surfaces just make it worse since the glove catches and drags instead of letting your hand slide.
6