Monday, February 9, 2009

Blue and Green Slip


All of a sudden it's cold outside again, so I decided to stay inside and continue my slip slop stain experiments. Remember this pinched porcelain bowl I made as a warm up after the holidays? Now I've used this same bowl to experiment with my first batch of sky blue slip. I decided to use a butterfly shape as a contrast to the colored slip. My pinched bowl is now a butterfly bowl. I don't have a clue what I'll do after I bisque the piece. Will I put a clear glaze over it? I'll wait to see how it turns after the bisque firing, then I'll decide.


A few weeks ago, I did some clay weaving. Today I put some of my green slip in a pattern on the woven tray. I do have a glazing plan for the remaining sections of this piece. I'm planning on using a matt yellow glaze with temoku accents over the top. I'll use clear glaze over the green stained sections.


Here's a porcelain wall pocket I made a few weeks ago. Again I am using a butterfly shape to contrast with green slip. I've no idea about the final outcome of this piece. That's half the fun of using clay as an artistic medium. Will it be glazed, pit fired, barrel fired, time will tell. Perhaps I will try it in a barrel firing. I'm still trying to get enough stuff bisqued for the barrel firing, hopefully next weekend I'll at least have one barrel firing.


This weekend I went to the feed store to get some straw (which was the last ingredient I still needed for my barrel firing). I noticed they had bales of rice hulls, so I got one bale. I knew I had read something about rice hulls before but couldn't remember what.

Now that I'm home I read rice hulls can be hard to burn, so perhaps I'll mix them in with some straw. I also read rice hulls contain large amounts of silica, but also contain sodium, potassium, calcium, magnesium, iron, copper, manganese and zinc. I plan to save the rice hull ash from the firing for future experiments. Wonder what would happen if I mixed some rice hulls into some wet clay? Or coffee beans - I think I remember something about them too. It's never ending, isn't it - so many ideas for clay and so little time.

How about you? What experiments have you done? Or what experiments would you like to do? Comments and advice are always welcome.

7 comments:

  1. Hey Linda, I am excited to see your butterfly bowl once it's glazed and fired. I think clear would be a nice choice, especially because it is a porcelain bowl! I've been experimenting with slip for the past semester and am always eager to see what other people do with it!

    Make sure to post some pictures of your barrel firing :)

    ReplyDelete
  2. the clay waeving and wall pieces are super cute!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Can't wait to see the slip bowl after it's fired! What slip did you use?

    ReplyDelete
  4. OOOOHhhh I love the butterfly wall vase holder thingy! Way Cute!
    Mary

    ReplyDelete
  5. Hi Mel, thanks I think I am going to put a clear over this. I may have to do some research as I would like a matt clear for this bowl if possible.

    Hi Gary, thanks I am having a lot of fun doing these, but they are time consuming.

    Hi Pinkiss, thanks I made slip from the same porcelain clay body and then added mason stains, see my previous post. I have decided to embelish the butterflies on the wall pocket and I will post on that tomorrow, so check back.

    Hi Mary, thank you so much. I am having fun with this, check tomorrow to see more about the wall pocket; it's looking kind of victorian looking which wasn't what I set out to do but it's ok with me. He he, sometimes the clay does what it wants to do.

    ReplyDelete
  6. I really like the soft slip colors. Hope to see the woven tray when it is finished.
    Not long ago I worked blue and green stains into cone 5 porcelain. Then I rolled small coils of each color into the white clay. It looked pretty bland after the bisque and I didn't like the powdery cone 5 porcelain, so I put it all aside as a failed experiment. Several weeks later a piece of this clay with stains found its way under another pot to catch any possible drips and was fired to cone 5. Then the colors were more beautiful than I thought they would be and I want to try again using another white clay.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Hi Barbara, thanks. So are you saying firing twice at Cone 5 made the colors brighter? These pieces I have done are Cone 10. I read Cone 10 will make them brighter so we shall see. I will post photos after they are fired. The blue bowl actually looks much better in person than it does in the photo. Be sure to see my post tomorrow, I have embellished the butterflies on the wall pocket with more slip.

    ReplyDelete

I love suggestions, questions, critiques, thanks for your comment