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A Ceramic Safari in East Africa

Left: The Hoffman kiln at Khorobhagarat, Sudan. Because this kiln fires heavy fuel oil, the wood previously burned in the clamp kilns of this arid region will be conserved.

This project proposal has been endorsed by the Khartoum office of the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO), and is waiting approval by UNIDO headquarters in Austria. On a widespread, international scale, UNIDO has been the only organization to support ceramic industrial projects. However, several Non-Government Organizations (NGOs) such as the German development group, GTZ, and the British based Intermediate Technology Development Group (ITDG), have also been active. These groups have executed several successful ceramic-related projects, primarily in the production of building materials. When the BRRI's newly designed vertical tunnel brick kiln begins functioning, it may well be the first of its kind on the African continent. It may also be the first anywhere to fire carbonized agricultural waste. In Asia, these kilns fire bituminous coal fines. Adapting to carbonized agri-waste offers a design that is appropriate and more sustainable in Africa.

Right: Sectional view of the vertical tunnel kiln.

The best I was able to do in the Sudan, besides adapting the vertical tunnel kiln, was to document what ceramists there are doing and the ways in which their products are essential in the everyday lives of the Sudanese. Ceramic ziers (water containers) are universally used to store water. Ziers are scattered around towns just like public drinking fountains, so necessary in the burning, dry climate. There is a generous custom in the Sudan, in which civic-minded individuals will donate and maintain ziers for the community and for any passersby. Low fire ceramics range from ziers to cooking pots as well as drums made by stretching animal skins over a ceramic base. In the absence of other entertainment, my family would often spend an evening drumming, pretending our rhythm and ceremony were as sophisticated as that of the Sudanese. In another custom, Sudanese drink coffee brewed in the traditional low fire gebana. The gebana resembles a sphere with a small cylindrical spout pointed 45 degrees out and upward. As with the zier, the gebana has a rounded bottom and is sometimes placed in the sand. But it normally rests in a cloth or beaded ring, a match in design to the coffee pot's incised decoration.

For the everyday ceramics of Sudan, whole communities are typically given over to production. Ziers, for example, are made in Dajo, near El Obeid, by women using a red clay with an addition of millet husks and mica. Often the clay is plastic, sun-parched mud, skimmed from the top of dried up water holes. Products including the gebana, drums, cook pots, and ziers are fired on a bonfire by the men of the community. From a scholar's perspective, Sudan is of interest to both the ceramic artist and the scientist. In Khartoum, the Sudan University Ceramic Department has offered a classical approach to art instruction for 40 years. The graphic and three-dimensional skills of the students are impressive. However, basic ceramic materials are lacking; glazes are expensive and usually imported from Egypt. Individual artists must have clay materials trucked in from several hours away. And the public has not been adequately sensitized to the high quality of local ceramic work produced, preferring instead mass produced imported ware.

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