Wednesday, July 26, 2023

SMALL WIN

This teabowl, still pinging away to its heart's content came out of the kiln late this morning. Though a bit hard to figure it out, the glaze is an old amber glaze I used forever that has been tweaked a bit and then had black iron oxide sprayed over it using an atomizer. As you can see, thick white slip was applied impasto style and then it was glazed and glazed again, fired and here it is. This was one of five distinct test bowls that were in the kiln to reaffirm some glazes I haven't used in a while as well as two new incarnations of older glaze formulas which are quite different that they originally started though for one of them I have to get most of the credit to Val Cushing for a hand out of glazes he gave me many years back (1991 or 1992). What I have learned from these recent tests is quite simple, the straight glaze as it stands works rather well as does the two variations including the one with the iron sprayed over and after some series of glaze tests and combinations, it is quite a welcome outcome to have all five tests work just as I had hoped. That is a small win but a win none the less in my book.