Students explore basic hand-building techniques using ceramic materials to make sculpture and vessels. Emphasis is placed on individual style and how clay can be used as a vehicle for expression. Students make work from low-fire clay using a combination of coil, slab, and texturing techniques, surface slips and glazes. An introduction to ideas about sculpture, the vessel, and the Raku process are presented through slide lectures and research assignments. At the conclusion of this course, students will be well-versed in hand-building techniques, basic glaze formulation, and firing of electric and Raku kilns. Students will learn to develop strategies to translate an idea into sculptural form. Prerequisite: none