Lee Love on mon 22 dec 03
Hypothetical/ Tests
I've had good luck getting lead type results using one of
Chappel's Boro-lithium glaze recipes. I've used copper and made a nice
glassy green. Also made an amber with the use of iron. I would have
liked to continue with this to develop a yellow glaze like what the English
slipware folks could get. Spodumene and the frits I used are more
difficult to get here in Japan.
A friend in Seattle who I met here in Mashiko, he is selling Mingei
folkcraft and antiques in Seattle (see details here):
http://www.enma.org/2003/EX/16wasabidou2003.htm , is going to help me with
materials so I hope to test these again in the cooler, more oxidized parts
of my kiln. My small woodkiln fires in a variety of atmospheres:
oxidation/neutral/reduction and from about seger cone 8 to seger cone 12
(seger is hotter than orton.)
Industry, chemical companies, and kiln manufacturers have us
brainwashed into thinking a uniformed firing kiln is a good thing. Of
course it is in industry, when you are trying to make everthing exactly
alike But actually, as a studio potter, once you get to know the kiln a
kiln that fires at a variety of atmospheres and temperature allows you to
get many different types of work out of a single firing. Often, the
discoveries come from the areas of the kiln that are "on the edge." It is
the same as what Hamada told Volukos back in the early '50s when he had
Hamada look at his "controlled", mundane pots when he said, "You should let
the clay work for you a little." The same can be said of kilns, "You
should let the kiln work for you a little bit."
I finally got some more photos of my pots up. You can see them
here (click on the photo of Me & My Dog.): http://mashiko.us
--
Lee In Mashiko, Japan
http://Mashiko.org
Web Log (click on recent date):
http://www.livejournal.com/users/togeika/calendar
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