Clay on Pause button

Last night was our clay class (thanks Mitzi!) and it was fun, again.
I threw some mugs and a bowl, and so I went back today to get handles on them and clean them up since I'll be away for a couple of weeks.
It is a nice place to go.  Lisa is the owner, and I believe that a place like that ( workroom, or a studio) takes it's cues from who is running it. She is very calm and laid-back and really willing to help out if you want advice.  There are also some "regulars" who go there in the afternoon who are also interesting to talk to.  It was such a good idea to get back to clay via this route.

I photographed a couple of things from the last glaze fire, and a couple of things from in the cupboard here, too!

 this mug used moon white clay, with medium blue moon white slip, and the rectangle of white is Loafer's glory slip. I wanted to see if they are compatible, and they are.  (No cracking in the white).  After they were bisque fired, I used a black underglaze pencil to draw the little dandelion design, and rose underglaze dots.  Covered in clear glaze.
Used this mug a couple of times and there is crazing in the glaze-- maybe the glaze fits the Loafer's glory clay better?

 A small mug-again with the moon white, with white satin glaze, with dots of Moss Green glaze, and the light green stripes are with avocado glaze stain/Gerstley Borate half and half.  Again the crazing, but what is nice is that the glaze stain is really nice on this glaze.  (I've had a lot of trouble in the past with overglaze decoration)

 Another small little cup, with the same combo as previous little mug, with the addition of the rim being dipped in Neptune blue glaze.  The blue was not as dark as I thought it would be. 
The white satin came out more as a translucent satin,
We'll see how it behaves on the Loafer's Glory.

The following are from ages ago, when I did the navy slip sgraffito stuff. 
It was such a dark blue that sometimes people thought it was black,

 We use this sugar bowl all the time. 
It has a chrysanthemum design on the lid.  It was inspired by Japanese designs.

 I was doing some decorating today, and Lisa surprised me by saying that she should try to be a little more loose in her decoration,( i.e. like I was being).  which surprised me a great deal, since I have always been so controlled.  You can see that on these last two pots, they are very "not loose", but my goal is also to be less tight, and more spontaneous.  Funny, isn't it, how we sometimes see things so differently.

Glaze testing

Spent the afternoon at the clay spot studio. It was quite a productive session. Several pieces had been bisque fired, and so I tried to glaze them somehow. Because the glazes are new to me I tried to keep a record of what I was doing but this soon became pretty hit and miss. Lisa has a nice reference set of tiles that are very helpful and so I hope that a couple of the pieces will turn out okay. I haven't done much with double dipping pieces before so I tried that on a few things-- note to self-- be sure to let them dry thoroughly before yanking so as not to disturb the glaze.
Then I tried some glaze trailing with one of those bulb things you squeeze that has different size ends. This was pretty messy. It has potential but I would have to practice a lot to avoid runs and gain some sort off control over where it goes.
Lisa gave me a bit of gerstley borate and so I mixed it half and half with the glaze stains I got in Asheville. I did some brushwork with it and also tried some banding on the wheel with it in the squeeze bulb thing and it worked okay.
I did some dots with dark blue and dark green glaze on lighter colored glazes. By that time I was getting a bit confused.
I did a few more glazy things and then realized I had come to the end. I washed the glaze off from one of the bowls since it was definitely ugly.
After all of that I was in need of a bit of fun. So I got a new bag of clay-- a different kind from before. It is called Loafer's glory or some such thing and it is a mid fire combo of porcelain and stoneware.
I loved it! It was creamy and smooth (except for a few bits of sponge it had picked up from the table when I was wedging it). I threw some cylinders to use for mugs. They have thin bottoms so that I won't need to trim them very much. They are sort of mel's shape, since I think that over time it is the mug shape that I like best. Also Richard likes that wide based shape for stability.
For the next glazing session I would like to work in some of the celadon glaze in combination with the satin white and maybe some blue accents.
I don't mind a bit of glazing but so far I think that I like using the undergazes better on the leather hard stage. I don't like handling the bisque as much. Also, I really like carving into the clay, whether through slip or not.
Also it might be interesting to try the shellac resist where you wipe away clay, but use something like polymer paint medium or wax.
So many things to try in order to find a combination that works that is fun to do and is aesthetically appealing.

Sequences

I'm trying to figure out some sort of process that combines slip/underglaze with sgraffito and antiquing.  possibly covered in a clear glaze
there seem to be endless permutations.
In my navy and white series, I made a form, let dry, applied large areas of slip, and carved when damp.  bisque fired, then glazed with clear.  5 steps.

so there are various processes that can be applied at various stages of the piece based on hardness, such as:
1. when soft
 impressed decoration

2. When the clay is leather hard
carving on base clay
large areas of slip/underglaze
brush strokes of slip/underglaze
mishima
underglaze pencil drawing
sgraffito through slip/underglaze to the clay layer

3. when the clay is bone dry
large areas of slip/underglaze (dip or brush)
brush strokes of slip/underglaze
slip trailing
underglaze pencil drawing
sgraffito through slip/underglaze to the clay layer

cuerda seca


3. When the clay is bisque fired
before glazing:
"antiqued" with brushed on/off oxides or stains
re-application of slips or underglazes
    (can go directly to cone 6 firing without additional glaze)

4. raw glazed:
overglaze decoration with stains/oxides using brush or sprayer

overglaze decoration with underglazes
sgraffito through overglaze decoration to the glaze layer
layered glazes, dipped, brushed or trailed

5. cone 6 fired
decals or lustres
refire to a different temp
 
I made a table on word-perfect to summarize this, but am unable to copy it to this format.
It is important to note that some techniques can be repeated numerous times at each stage of dryness, ex. apply slip, let dry , apply more slip or underglaze, or you could re-bisque many times to fix the layers of underglaze decoration.  I also didn't include resists, since I'm not too interested in using them right now.
the techniques are all based on cone 6 electric kiln firing, so I haven't included such things as burnishing, waxing, or different atmospheres like pit firing, raku, soda or salt, flashing slips,
also, the above are all ceramic processes, and so I haven't written down the option of painting with "room temperature" paints, such as acrylics,

So in Practical terms, what I'm wanting to do is make a series of test tiles in order to find the sequences and combinations that create the color and texture that I desire in the finished pieces.
What I'm hoping to avoid are the several hour test tiles, -- those pieces that one blithely works through, assuming that what one envisions will really happen..... then the colors turn out to be quite different than expected, the underglazes are transluscent instead of opaque, etc, etc,

Also, I need to make them based on the processes that I enjoy doing!
i.e.  I like to carve leather hard clay, brush on colors, sgraffito through color, dip in glazes,
I do not like to: handle it too much when raw-glazed (dusty, smudges) no lustres (smelly, toxic)

Although this seems really simple, it is actually a lot to keep in mind, and the number of test tiles increases exponentially when you want to answer a question!

Decorative Surfaces

I am quite interested in the surface decoration of pieces.
In the past, I concentrated mainly on three styles of pottery.
1. the low fire majolica, mostly red clay, white glossy glaze with overglaze painting using Mason Glaze stains. This was mostly for personal use at home.

 2.  the cone 6 porcellainous white stoneware:  it was a blend of P300 (porcelain) and M370(light colored stoneware), which I mixed myself because I had a pug mill.
The dark blue and white with gold trim:
this was thrown with quite clean profiles, and decorated with sgraffito patterns in the navy slip.  Glazed with a clear gloss and then a third firing to add the gold.  Note to self-- I don't want to do any more luster decorations--toxic fumes.

3. And the third main style was of course the bunny-ware.  Same cone 6 clay body, with an off-white satin glaze, with molded additions, overglaze decoration in pink, brown and greens using mason stain/glaze combo.

4. In addition, there was a smaller group of pots that turned out quite well.  The same cone 6 clay body, carved designs with a variety of blue, green and turquoise clear glazes, sometimes with white satin.  Usually a different color inside the pot than the outside.