02/24/2007 (1:59 pm)
February firing
I fired the kiln last weekend. Much of the work was ruined due to being overfired. The colors and glaze held up OK, but the clay body itself experienced extreme bubbling - I think it was starting to melt. If I had continued to increase the heat, everything may have turned into blobs. This should have been a cone 5 firing, but the bottom part of the kiln got to about cone 8 and none of the work from that part of the kiln was salvagable. Luckily, it did not get as hot in the top, and most pieces survived. This was purely a negligent mistake and in the future I will be vigilant about checking the kiln at close intervals near the end of the firing.
I have been making small bowls that can be used for eating sushi or holding measured spices while cooking, or holding a teabag after it has finished steeping… there are many uses for these tiny dishes. I put a quarter in the first picture to give you an idea of the size.
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These bowls are the same diameter but are about twice as deep as the previous ones:
This plate is about six inches in diameter:
The vase is about six inches tall:
The technical stuff:
All pieces but the vase are made with Laguna ^5 B-Mix clay. The dot work was done with colored slips. I make the slip out of the same clay body and color it with 5-10% Mason stains, and apply with slip trailing bottles and brushes. Slips are applied at the greenware stage and a transparent glaze is applied at the bisque stage.
The vase is slab-built from Laguna WS-5 clay and glazed with Georgie’s glazes. The small bowls in the first picture were made from B-Mix and glazed with the same glazes as the vase.
That’s all, folks. Thanks for looking.
