Jonathan Pennington on mon 24 dec 01
Sorry, my posts are always long. Read at your own risk.
I personally don't use glaze recipes published anywhere- not as a
recipe anyway. Everything is so variable, I don't think that I've
*ever* (in my short potting life) had a glaze recipe "work." I've
decided to always breakdown recipes into unity, then build them up
from "scratch" into something I can understand. I guess I'm naive in
that I thought everyone did. I actually wrote a message to the list
replying to a question about metallic glazes and I think I might have
added a recipe from Michael Bailey (I don't know if that's what Ron
Roy was talking about or not) but I was sort of doing so because I was
trying to illustrate an idea, not trying to give a recipe. To me, it
was like saying "Michael Bailey stopped his from over fluxing by
playing with the clay content." I didn't realize that to others it
might have been saying "Use this recipe." It's actually a bit scary to
me that we call them "recipes" at all, as if we are assuming it's that
easy.
I'm glad that the subject of posting recipes was brought up because I
may not have thought about it.
I pre-ordered MasteringGlazes, but if I saw a recipe posted from it,
the last thing I would do is to go and use it. I'd probably buy the
book (not probably, I *would*) to learn as much as I could about how
*they* got this to work, then formulate my own *based* on that (still
giving credit even so, that it's based on such and such). I figured
this is what everyone would do. In my innocence, I might have posted
recipes from Mastering Glazes, were it not for this thread. I would
have done this not expecting people to use *that* "recipe" (why would
they expect it to work, knowing *nothing* of the original users
environment and controls?), but as something leading to an idea,
fully expecting the person to buy the book to fully understand it,
then reformulate it to their own environment.
I'm sorry if I offended anyone. Even if it wasn't my post that Ron was
talking about, I'm sorry anyway, because I've undoubtedly done this
without thinking about it. I'd hate for things to work out badly.
Anyway, speaking of glazes, I got the blues! :-)
My X-mas present from the Kiln God is new glazes! (Well,
reformulated versions of other people's glazes, but aren't the all?
:-) "Twilight Blue" and "Mossy Green" (Wife does the naming). The
green I've been playing with for almost a year, it was originally in
Michael Bailey's book from Terri Storer (GA28). As with, honestly, any
glaze, it worked in the picture, not on my pots. It was actually the
impetus for my learning glaze chemistry. I broke it down, tweaked the
unity formula, played and built it back up again and again. Now I have
a Green glaze that is almost, but not quite, exactly unlike Terri
Storer's GA28 :-) (Slightly similiar unity formula, very different
recipe). Her's breaks blue, mine is weird, but once I
learned it's personality, it's wonderful. Matte glaze. Single coat:
brown pooling dark green, double coat: nice deep mossy green, triple
coat (really!): bright green. Oh, have I mentioned how *incredibly*
important my firing schedule and clay choice are. I changed a 90
minute soak to a 20 minute soak and got a different glaze. On one of
my clays, this crawls horribly, another, it's beautiful. It overlaps
very nicely with my other new glaze.
Twilight blue was taken from Bailey's book as well. Judy Musicant's
GA24 is Brilliant Shiny Cobalt Blue, I broke it down and decided on
changes based on my playing with glazes here and what I've found
generally works and generally doesn't. For instance, I don't use
Cobalt Oxide (CoCO3 instead), my F-4 feldspar is wierd and ghastly
borate is worrisome, although I have it. I mixed a test batch with
GA24's original recipe, and I got an ugly matty blackish
thing. Horrible. Reformulated and tweaked, however, it is the most
beautiful cobalt blue! Shiny, reliable, blends beautifully with my
other standard glazes (very important to me). Recipe wouldn't work and
only my admittidly basic knowledge of glaze chemistry allows me to get
what I want.
By the way, it's very true. Blue sells. I'm not even *trying* to sell
my pottery yet, and I've sold pieces! I've got a professional
photographer who wants to trade mugs and small vases (the 1/5minute
type) for photographing my pots. Everytime I go over to have a box of
stuff photographed, I'll bring a couple mugs, vases and
bowls... as long as they are the blue glazes. Beautiful when we both
think we're getting the better part of the deal!
Yeah, I've a feeling 2002 is going to rock!
-J
--
Jonathan Pennington | jwpennin@bellsouth.net
"There are no pots, there is only clay." -original
"It's hard to take life too seriously
when you realize yours is a joke." -also original
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