Monday, January 25, 2016

ONE OF THESE THINGS IS NOT LIKE THE OTHERS

I did a glaze fire last Thursday and unloaded on Saturday to the usual mixed bag of results. The top was a bit hot and everything matured well while the bottom was just a bit cooler where a group of flower pots for my wife were. They look fine but the glaze is just a tiny bit under fired and could have benefited from about 10 degrees more in temperature. The kiln had an array of squared serving bowls, a hand full of mugs, vases and covered jars with the obligatory group of teabowls to fill in here and there. Illustrated are the four thrown/altered/slipped teabowls that we in the firing all finished with hand cut feet to compliment the pieces. I had intended to glaze two in my Oribe and two in the gosu style Ao+ but accidently dipped the third bowl in the Oribe before I knew what I was doing. I normally have a pretty rigid plan in place for glazing where I have all the pieces laid out and separated in to groups for various glazes and glaze combinations but I had all six teabowls (the other two glazed in saffron) on a small board across my wheel head as I had run out of room on my large table and folding table that I bring out when I glaze. So the outcome is that rather than two teabowls only one of these things is not like the others; certainly not a catastrophe and since all four came out okay, I really have no complaints.
I was thinking about what would jump start my Monday after a recently completed cycle and could think of nothing better than BSO;