A Little More Each Day

And it's Mud Colony time again! see what other potters are doing, here

Well now that my kiln is operational again, I've been firing it pretty steadily with the stuff I had been accumulating from making things all summer.  It's pretty exciting to see the colors come to life, and I can't stop feeling so happy about the success of the clear glaze.

Today was a gorgeous autumn day, so I was able to take some photos outside.
What I need to do is to try to analyze which colors work well together, what shapes I want to pursue,

two similar cups, with the same color combinations, although the mugs are different shapes, they are about the same size

tray, about 5" x 9", this sort of sagged in the middle,

I liked the way the greens interacted on the silk-screened part of this piece,

I like the buttery yellow background, and the rest is brushwork on this bowl  I might try to use this pattern again

close-up of a couple of layered screens.  I like using some basic shapes as backgrounds.  I also think that the dark brown underglaze is one of the most useful colors.

an artsy shot from above, of some of the little slab vases.  I really enjoyed making these shapes, plus they give a great surface for all sorts of decorative techniques

this shows just how luscious the glaze is. 

thrown mug, hand-built mug.  The glaze covers the rims of the thrown pieces really nicely, but some of the slab pieces are a bit rough on some edges.  I think I need to either smooth them more, or make sure that there is enough glaze on them.  This might also be that the glaze doesn't cover as thickly when there is underglaze on the rim.

handbuilt mug, I like the combo of colors

Maybe I need to make some sort of reference chart to refer to.  It seems that I'm always wanting to make charts...
 Maybe I could pull a lot of info together into a photo collage (or two or three)

four views of one mug. 

 Thanks for stopping by!

More decorating

I continue to decorate greenware,

 a couple of vases, mugs and bowls. Also a little footed bowl-- (they sure are hard to get on straight when you put the bowl on top of the base,)
I am really liking the combination of mishima next to the colored areas with slip trailing on the vases.

I'd like to get the vases a bit taller next time,
There is a bit of silk screen stencilling on the bowls,

 I've been making silk-screens, but have to get used to how to use them. 

 These things I decorated a week or so ago, and glazed them a few days ago.

Looking forward to seeing some fired work soon. 
A good thing about getting back to Saskatoon will be to get my kilns hooked up and my little studio working. 

Nb. Mitzi-- I left a mug for you on your shelf at the Clay Spot!

pattern play

 I am learning how to make silkscreens to add more pattern to the surface of the pots
It is interesting, but I need to develop more familiarity with it.
I made a few screens last week, and on Thursday I made some pots with flattish areas to put the pattern on. 

 Monday, I trimmed up the items, and put handles on the two mugs.  I did some decorating at the studio, but wasn't able to concentrate too well, and so I brought a few of the things home to decorate later in the day when I can think better. 

 I'm liking the turquoise, brown and red combo.

 this screen with the little flowers seems to be the most useful one I have made to date.

You daub thick underglaze through the screen on to the surface of the pot, and it helps if the surface is smooth. 

Mishima in Progress

The inlaid "slip" that I used is really a mix of black and white underglaze, thinned down a bit.  I like the charcoal color better than a jet black.

The leaf-like patterned one in the center has the pattern from top to bottom, whereas the one to its left has a bit of empty space above and below the pattern.  I might put something in that area. 
i'm thinking that the inside of the mugs could have a green glaze, It would be fun to have a bright turquoise, but the studio doesn't have one that color, I don't think,
The flowery ones sort of remind me of molly Hatch ones,
On a couple of the mugs, I tried a technique that I saw on a video demonstration by Erin Furminsky, on Ceramicartsdaily
It has some slip trailed decoration that is quite raised.  Then there are layers of underglaze painted over it all.  Finally you scrape off the layers so that the slip trailing is exposed, and some of the layers of underglaze.  The underglaze had really gotten dry by the time I got back to do the scraping, so I ended up exposing some of the clay body as well, but we'll see how it all turns out.

 Finally for today, this is the butter dish that is hand-built that I made a few weeks ago.  As you can see, we have been using it, and it works pretty well!

 I like the base with it's slip wash, although the texture on the right side wasn't deep enough to hold on to it when I washed it away.  For one of my first hand built pieces, I'm quite happy with how it turned out!

Moon White clay, cone 6, clear satin glaze with glaze stain decoration.

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.