Glaze Happy

I'm really really happy. I'm finally getting someplace with these Coyote glazes. These photos are some of the really good ones. I love the plum blossom sake bottle especially. I used glaze chalk to draw the blossoms on the greenware, then we bisque-fired the bottle. Afterwards I glazed the bottom in coyote black, and the top in amaco's blue rutile. The tea-bowl set is decorated in wax resist, dipped in amaco's shino, coyote black with some dribbles of coyote's gunmetal green. I'm happy with the glaze but the design is too busy for me overall. I think the wax resist was too much. I'm going to make another with no resist. The bowl is really cool and the recipe was borrowed from Gloria H. at my teaching studio (Bear Hands Pottery). First it's dipped in light green shino, then eggplant is brushed halfway down the bowl (inside and out) then the lip of the bowl is brushed with Pansy Purple, finally I threw a little archie's base in the middle for some interest (all Coyote glazes). It looks kind of like the northern lights!

Finally, here is a photo of the Koi Fish pot that Chris carved. He built it with slabs and carved the picture, I glazed, he fired. It came out beautifully. I used Velvet underglazes like watercolors on the fish, which we fired to bisque. Then I used wax to protect the underglaze, and applied light blue shino (coyote) to the background. We are working on a whole series of pots done in this carved technique and they are really time consuming but fun. I just painted an egret pot last night and it is going to be really beautiful!

This recent kiln full showed some progress and, yet I'm still working on getting "my look" so to speak. I haven't settled into a style quite yet and I keep wondering what it will be. I am experimenting with lots of recipes and clays. I love the white clay with bright flowing colors, the shinos with their soft breaking browns and the rich black which contrasts so nicely with other colors. It really depends on my mood which clay I want to throw on any given day. Maybe it's a case of too many choices? I look at millions of pottery pictures, and, very few pots I hate. My tastes range so far, yet my knowledge is very limited. Oriental pottery, for instance, appeals to me more now than ever. I love not the fancy Chinese paintings (although admirable) but the rustic tea bowls, fired with wood and painted with salt or ashes. I enjoy looking at slumpy, organic looking structures as well as more precise ones. I love majolica, and other painted techniques, and clay that isn't glazed at all.

Right now, I'm working on my line of bear pottery. I'm throwing and decorating right now, several different styles of mugs, plates, covered dishes etc.,. trying to get a feel for what style I like best. It's really weird, but I'm designing everything around a cookie mold! It's a very cool mold of the Berne Walking Bear popular symbol of Berne Switzerland, our sister city. Since our big 300th anniversary is coming up, I want to have pottery ready to commemorate it! I'm even going to bring some to the Tryon Palace and see if they will sell it in their gift shop. I decided on speckled brownstone for the clay body, but I might go to red-stone with no speckles. I'll see how this first batch comes out of the glaze. There are some glaze techniques I am working on that include laying glaze into lines in the clay and scraping it away from the higher points and using wax resist. I'll post pictures of the first bear pots when they come out.