On and off
for the past several years I have been making these thick combed slip bottles
in predominantly three glaze surfaces; Oribe, AO+ and iron yellow saffron.
Recently I received an email and asked if I could make a large AO+ bottle
destined as a gift, normally the largest I tend to make is about 16" tall
but they wanted something over 20" when it was fired. Piece of cake I
thought and I set about throwing the bulk of the form and then added two coils
and threw the rest to the shoulder and luted a neck to the pot when it was firm
enough. Once tooled, I applied the thick slip and combed it and was pretty
confident all was well. As you may imagine, this is where things went askew as
the very top and bottom were slightly different in how dry they were and the
addition of the very thick and wet slip caused a split on the inside of the pot
where the first coil was added. This of course went unnoticed until the pot was
bisque and came out with a crack about 5 inches long and just wide enough to
slip a sheet of paper into, hammer-time. For my follow-up I decided to throw the
form in three pieces, base, top and neck and luted them together, covered it in
plastic letting it equalize, tooled it the next day and waited until the last
conceivable moment to thick slip the piece. The pot came out of the kiln last
week, measured in at just under 21" and was immediately packed and shipped
out the same day and that is why no photo is included. Hubris and routine will
sneak up on you and give you a good smack every now and again which is probably
a good thing for a necessary course correction.
Illustrated
is the culprit that got this adventure started basking in the sun in an old
picture taken several years ago. Thick combed slip bottle about 12" tall with my AO+ glaze
overall.
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