MORE COPPER BLUE

A few years back, I decided to try to develop a clear glaze that would fire to cone 02 or there about with the sole purpose of using it as a base for colored glazes. I would add red iron oxide, cobalt, copper and manganese carbonate & cobalt to try to produce an amber, blue, green and purple translucent or transparent glaze. The other criterion was to use frit 3124 instead of 3110 as I have inherited quite a bit of the 3124 and using the 3110 on a regular basis was getting a bit costly. The base glaze is composed of 3124, flint and ball clay with the additions of the various colorants to produce a good transparent, rich surface. The plus side to developing these glazes was; it is easy to fit small colored glaze pieces into the kiln when I am firing terra cotta and the pots look quite a bit different than the Abstrakt Resist, carved Tebori and black and white slip works.

Illustrated is a terra cotta teabowl that was first decorated in black and white slip and then glazed over in a copper blue glaze and fired to cone 02. The verses pattern under this glaze gives it an entirely different look and feel then when done in my Abstrakt Resist.