clay: glaze outcomes

One late afternoon in the studio the day before Christmas eve, I returned to this candelabra, still very soft. After messing and smoothing it as much as I could, I finally just let it get more leather hard and worked on another piece. If this piece doesn't get too wonky and will be level enough to fire further, then I want to overglaze with Chocola-tea.

In the meantime, I could finally sgrafitto this pot. Full disclosure. I had made another form layered with black underglaze and started carving it, which ended up looking like shit and so tossed it into the reclaim bucket. This carving felt like a do-over though I kept the border a single line, which I'll likely fill with Western Bright Red underglaze.

I do like that these carvings finally look like tomatoes, and so on to the greenware shelf they went. I'm thinking they'll function as a small serving dish for Caprese salad. 

One of the few bowls I threw that I didn't mind getting bisque fired was an experiment in the studio's newest midfire glaze layered upon one of my favorite Cone 6 glazes. I used a fan brush to layer that new glaze on top of the other.

 

A matte on top of a shiny glaze yielded an interesting surface of holes and a metallic-looking brown in the Chocola-tea on top of the Teal Appeal.

I was finally throwing a little bigger and got experimental with trimming this bowl's foot a little smaller, probably trying to echo the shape of a tea bowl. I was hopeful about the outcome of the studio's newest glaze.

 

I like this matte brown surface a lot even if I find it funny that I can now see where I could not uniformly raise the pot so that there are thinner and thicker areas in the walls of the bowl, and one can see where the clay was starting to sag and slump when I was trimming its foot because of that inconsistency. I don't care though because it charts my learning, and I just simply like it.

Because I am pleased by this bowl, I will keep it and maybe even even use it at my Sunday Feast of Seven Fishes. That evening in the two days before Christmas was pleasant, working alongside Meral and making yet another holiday tree with star cut-outs. We said we would return to Clay Life the next morning until it closed at 1 p.m. for Christmas Eve. 

However, I ended up coming alone to the studio and was pleasantly surprised to discover a sgraffito pot I forgot I carved and a curvy candelabra on the bisque shelf. I pondered how to glaze the candelabra quite a bit. I ended up brushing Ghost Blue, which is a white gloss with hints of light blue all over the pot even underneath which I had taped as resist the bottom. Amy, a teacher and studio technician suggested a Floating Green or Juicy Fruit, which are runny, a 1/4" below the rims of the taper holders. I put it back on the bisque shelf to later scrape drip marks with a metal rib and to touch up bare spots and brush with more Ghost Blue glaze. And I'll probably brush the taper rims with Floating Blue to mimic ocean waves.

I was pleasantly surprised how this sgraffito carving turned out. I guess it will end up being Sgrafitto #7.

I ended up brushing bare spots with more red and black underglazes and then brushed thin layers of clear glaze on top. I remember being so dissatisfied with this carving, but now I think it's not so bad despite the misshapenness of the left and right tomatoes. Isn't it ironic that I've carved something generated by AI, and that the carved images now evince imperfections from my eye and hand?