{"id":13948,"date":"2022-02-07T19:11:52","date_gmt":"2022-02-07T19:11:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/clay-wood.com\/?p=13948"},"modified":"2024-02-24T13:55:32","modified_gmt":"2024-02-24T18:55:32","slug":"bulgarian-pottery-an-incomplete-survey","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/clay-wood.com\/?p=13948","title":{"rendered":"Bulgarian Pottery, An Incomplete Survey"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"The things we make and how we make them is the primordial stew of worlds. Things offer a local and infinitely large story. All things, like local food, dialects, patterns found in rugs and an alphabet of ceramic pot design and decoration draw out a map of influence, story and earth. Ceramics like most things made and collected, in every region, function to participate in the world on a spectrum between useful and ornamental. In Bulgaria handmade pottery, both useful and decorative is a well establish part of everyday life. Likewise, is the importance of historic and ancient pottery plays in the imagination of many Bulgarians and certainly its potters.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Neolithic Pottery.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Ceramics and the neolithic came unusually early to the region of Bulgaria. Ceramic figures have been found in Bulgaria that date eight thousand years before the present. <\/span>1<\/sup><\/a><\/span>The earliest people that brought ceramics into this region most likely experienced an ebb and flow of migrations from the ancient Levant and Middle East, Anatolia, the Steppes of Asia and back and fourth through the Mediterranean.<\/span>2<\/sup><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"In the broad history of Bulgarian ceramics a wealth of stylistic diversity is matched with innovation supported by good geological resources offering a supply of usable clays.<\/span>3<\/sup><\/a><\/span>The unusual richness ceramics in Bulgaria seems to have a particular incredulity as the size of this crossroad state is just under that of Ohio.<\/span>4<\/sup><\/a><\/span>Still, the Balkan Peninsula, in general, is a region rich in ancient ceramics.<\/p>\n

Bordering on Turkey and Greece to the south, the Black sea to the east, the Danube to the north and sharing a frontier with Serbia and Northern Macedonia to the west Bulgaria sits as a hinge between the Mediterranean, the Mideast and Europe. <\/span>5<\/sup><\/a><\/span>People have been traveling through and making a home at this most southeastern place in Europe for a very long time. In one cave, Kozarnika cave \u2013 located in northeast Bulgaria stone tools and flakes have been found that date back about one and a half million years.<\/span>6<\/sup><\/a><\/span> At Bacho Kiro Cave human remains date to 47,000 before the present and are the oldest found in Europe.<\/span>7<\/sup><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"
Troyan Pottery in a Velingrad Gift Store<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"\"
Busintisi Museum, Busintisi Bulgaria<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Today the best known ceramic traditions in Bulgaria, to foreigners are the Troyan and the Busintsi. Troyan, a multi-colored, feathered slipware, is better known. Troyan pottery thrives and its pottery is routinely found in Bulgarian homes and, in some measure, defines Bulgarian identity. It is fairly ubiquitous in Bulgaria; you can find it well displayed by street-side vendors, in some general dry good stores and almost all tourist shops. The large earthenware gyuvech pots and smaller covered bowls for serving are the easiest to find though fancy plates and bowls are also available. Busintsi is the more creative tradition but was virtually wiped out during the Communist era. Though the historic resources of the town offer significant possibilities, Busintisi presently sits in cold storage despite attempts to revive it as a place for ceramic arts. Busintsi ware takes its inspiration from the Byzantine but spins off from that cue in often dramatic and interesting ways. A museum as well as the homes of some of the town’s preeminent potters survive. There is an entertaining book, The Marvelous Busintsi Ceramics: A Phenomenon of Bulgarian Ethnoculture by Z\u030civkov and Zelenkova, that tells the story of the tradition.<\/span>8<\/sup><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

Despite evident ceramic arts talent throughout Bulgaria, the state has been doing a poor job supporting artists and art as a public good in Bulgaria. It is astounding fact that, to my knowledge, every wheel kiln and all other studio machinery in Bulgaria is made to order for by resourceful potters for other potters by the potters themselves. Pottery wheels are a luxury, most are foot powered. However, with recent \u2013 positive \u2013 changes in Bulgarian government the situation is likely to improve.<\/span>9<\/sup><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"
Daniella Petrova, Valintin Naydenov and Anna Popova<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"\"
Pavilkani Roman Museum<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

While the self sufficiency and ingenuity of the Bulgarian potters is to be admired, the absence of communal pottery spaces and tools narrow the field in a way that is not helpful either for potters of little means or public understanding of these arts. Because tools are hard to come by opportunities for training are likewise not plentiful. The kinds opportunities available to Americans to get a taste of ceramic classes at a recreation or art center are very hard to come by in Bulgaria. Another struggle that aspiring ceramic artists experience in Bulgaria is the persistence of an attitude from communist times that built a strong dividing line professional and non professional artists.<\/p>\n

Anna Popova, a ceramic artist (and the writer’s wife) studied with two potters near Sofia: Zahari Ivanoff and the husband and wife team of Valentin Naydenov and Daniella Petrova. Breaking away from attitudes that kept \u201ccraft secrets\u201d close to the chest, these potters have intentionally shared their skills with the community. Zahari lives in Sofia, and works at the National Art Academy and frequently offers short term workshops to children and families. Valentin and Daniella live in Vlado Trichkov, a village accessible by train and just north of Sofia. They both teach children and adults and run a pottery. I have met all three of these potters and spent a wonderful day with Valentin and Daniella.<\/p>\n

My first-hand knowledge of Bulgarian pottery, incomplete but not unrepresentative, comes from visits to places easily accessible from Sofia or Velingrad with the exception of a more distant excursion to the Pavilkani Roman ceramics production museum in north central Bulgaria.<\/span>10<\/sup><\/a><\/span> Pavilkani is an extraordinary outdoor museum and excavation site that includes excavations of Roman era pottery workshops and kilns, the remains of owner’s villa and baths as well as reconstructed first century pottery studio and kilns. I have not yet made a visit to Troyan from where the iconic low fire Bulgarian slipware is made.<\/p>\n

Given the complexity and bulk of the subject some kind of imposed division and structure is in order. Because of the wealth of the history of Bulgarian pottery with a time depth of over nine thousand years, The posts will proceed, therefore, chronologically with five posts starting with this introduction and a survey of the Neolithic and prehistoric to the present time. I will confine the survey to seven posts:<\/p>\n

1) This Introduction 2) Early \u2013 late Paleolithic \u2013 to the emergence of ceramics. (1.4 million b.p. – 8K bp.) A look at some of the earliest Hominin sites found in Europe to the first signs of pottery in, mostly, northern regions of Bulgaria along the Danube and Northeast coast of the Black Sea. Also described is the emergence of Old Europe. 3) Neolithic to immigration of the lettered people the central Mediterranean. (8Kbp. – 300BCE) A fuller description of the ceramic \"\"art of Old Europe to a change in the culture six thousand years ago after a brief era with fewer artifacts and a reemergence that includes Thracian cultures. 4) Ceramics made during the First Bulgarian State through the fall of Ottoman domination 600AD-134; A brief description of ceramic art appearing amid many bloody conflicts between kingdoms in the eastern Mediterranean, principally the Byzantine Empire and their Balkan neighbors as well as the establishment of a Bulgarian identity. Pottery made in Bulgaria through the end of the last Bulgarian state (1396) to the end of Ottoman domination in 1878. 5) Ceramics at the beginning of the new Bulgaria: 1878 \u2013 1912; 6) Ceramics in an era of modern war and Stalinism: 1912 \u2013 1944 \u2013 1989; and finally, 7) Ceramics after the fall of the Berlin Wall, 1989-Present.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The things we make and how we make them is the primordial stew of worlds. Things offer a local and infinitely large story. All things, like local food, dialects, patterns found in rugs and an alphabet of ceramic pot design and decoration draw out a map of influence, story and…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":13954,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[66,69],"tags":[201,198,200,199,202],"class_list":["post-13948","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-craft-and-society","category-history-of-ceramics","tag-bulgarian-art","tag-bulgarian-pottery","tag-history-of-balkan-pottery","tag-history-of-bulgarian-pottery","tag-paleolithic-art"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/clay-wood.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/Busc-hangpts-2-1-scaled-e1644254916850.jpg?fit=1600%2C1600&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/paTshs-3CY","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/clay-wood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13948","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/clay-wood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/clay-wood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clay-wood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clay-wood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13948"}],"version-history":[{"count":39,"href":"https:\/\/clay-wood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13948\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14406,"href":"https:\/\/clay-wood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13948\/revisions\/14406"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clay-wood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/13954"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/clay-wood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13948"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clay-wood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13948"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clay-wood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13948"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}