Glazing Mugs, Plates, and Lemon Squeezers

My kid's reaction to a calendar snafu on the first day of online school

I was able to bisque and glaze almost a full kiln last week. Studio work this summer been slow, but work has gotten done. I used up all my porcelain clay and ordered more about a month ago. I ordered it from Tacoma and they sent it USPS to a different address in Yakima. Strangely they sent the other stuff I ordered to my house. Then they had to send they back to Tacoma before sending it back to Yakima for me. 50lbs of the clay made it to my house a week or two ago. The other 50lbs appear to be trapped in the USPS black hole. The clay has left Tacoma, but the tracking doesn't identify any more movement. I assume no one at USPS wants to pick up this 50lb box during the chaos and I don't blame them. 

bisque ware waiting to be glazed, mugs, plates, citrus squeezers and bulbs

Because I used different temperature clay for different projects, I wasn't able to fire the bulbs in the same firing as the plates, mugs, and citrus squeezers, so those haven't gotten done. I keep thinking I will make time to throw some more so I can fill a kiln to fire the mugs and bulbs I finished after this last firing, but I haven't done it yet. Instead I'm working on online classes, doing union stuff, and procrastinating. Today, I am also trying to calm down my kid, whose reaction to online school has been stomping, crying, and generally freaking out. First there was an error in the timing of the first class, then the link to the second class doesn't work. After solving the first issue, she allowed up to 12 minutes for her teacher to help on the second, but just in case he didn't reply, she started freaking out immediately. Um, so my hope for the school year is that this 7th grader learns patience?

porcelain plates from the second firing, and one stoneware clay on the top right

I'm pretty happy with the plates from this batch. In the first round my glaze application was irregular on some, and because I was worried about glazes dripping in the kiln, I put the plates on stilts. This was a dumb solution, because not only did I not put enough glaze on to drip, making the plates look a little splotchy, firing on stilts also warped the plates. This time around I used more glaze and did not stilt the plates, so there's less splotchiness and all the plates are flat and even.

porcelain plates in yellow, pink and peach

I also changed the shape for most of these plates because they were done on request. The person who ordered them wanted small plates with a flat flared rim. She liked them, so three of the six porcelain plates have been sold since I took these pictures. Four of the plates were done in a groggy sculpture clay, which is serviceable, but mutes the glaze colors and doesn't look as nice.

On all the plates I drizzled other colors inside. The reds and a sparkly glaze look particularly nice in person, but the photos didn't capture the colors as well.

I also glazed three screaming face mugs I made with the porcelain clay. I used dark glazes to highlight the features and wrinkles, and a semi-transparent glaze for the entire exterior. I am not excited about the result. The faces look too white and too plain. Part of the problem is the limited number of glazes I had (partly because I used some up on the plates) and part of the problem is that I didn't leave enough of the dark glazes in the wrinkles and indents. I have ordered some new glazes so on the next batch I can bring more color, assuming the glazes also don't end up in USPS limbo.

My kid's reaction to an error in a Google Meet link on the first day of school

I think these faces would look better if I layered more colors. I usually do this with my underglazed sculpture, putting down a base coat on bisque ware before a second firing, then layering a wash of contrasting color over the first. I haven't tried that with these glazes, but I'm considering it. Underglazes and glazes handle differently, but it's worth a shot.

screaming face mug with minimal color in the eyes and eyebrows

I did minimal mixing of colors in these mugs, but I was tentative compared to my "usual" work. I also did some mixing/layering in the new lemon squeezers, but for some reason the yellow and blue showed up best and overwhelm the other colors (or maybe I forgot to use much other than blue and yellow). I know I used the red/pink on at least two pieces and now it is barely evident.

 

most of the citrus squeezers from the second batch, in both porcelain and sculpture clay

Something else happened in the glaze firing for these citrus squeezers. And this requires a bit of back-story. When I was in college, my clay professor told us that anytime we had a contained air pocket, it needed to be pierced so that the air could escape. If not, it would risk blowing up in the kiln. This is pretty conventional wisdom in the clay world and I know I've repeated it often enough. I remember one instance when I remembered too late that I had forgotten to pierce an air hole in a piece. When I opened the kiln I was surprised to see the piece had not exploded. At the time, my professor and I guessed that it was because I was using a raku clay, which is more porous than other clays.

more blue and yellow squeezers

Many years later, I joined a clay community on Facebook. One of the regular topics that comes up over and over again is that air pockets don't cause explosions during firing, only wet clay does. The reasoning goes that air is so small that it either doesn't need to escape or escapes through the walls of the clay. I allowed students to test this theory in class. Usually the pieces didn't explode, but sometimes they did. When asked, the folks in this online clay community assumed that these students must have soaked the pieces before glazing, or the pieces were simply too thick, or there was unaccounted for moisture left even after a long candle (candle means preheating the kiln to drive out excess moisture) or long drying time.

the bottoms of these two squeezers expanded due to expanding air inside during firing

It's difficult to rule out all these options with student work, but the results seemed inconclusive. This still bugs me, so I periodically test the theory. In my first citrus squeezers, I pierced the forms, leaving an unnecessary/essential escape for any heated air. This time around I did not pierce the forms. None of the pieces exploded in either firing, but in the glaze firing the bottoms of two of the pieces, which I had set on stilts in the kiln, expanded during the firing, going from a slightly concave base to a slightly convex base. Meaning that an air pocket inside did, in fact, expand during the firing and was unable to escape, suggesting that my online clay community, despite regular repetitions, is incorrect on this topic.

Glazing: Lemon Squeezers and Plates

lemon squeezers

I did some glazing and firing this week, mostly because I wanted to get my lemon squeezers done so we could use them. They work great and it doesn't seem to make a big difference what the fluting on the bulb is shaped like..

lemon squeezers in blue and yellow

I glazed them with mostly cone 5-6 Celadons from Amaco. I like these glazes for their bright colors and because the colors look different when they are thicker, such as when they are pooled in the low areas of a texture or of the fluting in the lemon squeezer.

this little lime squeezer stands up on its end, but I didn't realize it until after I took the pictures.

I made these squeezers with some porcelain clay I had laying around, and on just one I ended up wiping the colored celadon away from the raised part of the squeezer top and finishing that raised surface with clear celadon (which looks white on porcelain clay). I wish I had done this with all of them. I used a similar layering technique with some of the bottoms of the lemon squeezers.

both of these pieces have layered glaze to highlight the textures

I am also happy that all six, even the ones with a lean to them, stand up on their ends on the counter. They're small enough to fit in a drawer, but they look nice enough to stand on the counter. I've run one through the dishwasher, but they're also super easy to just rinse off after lemon squeezing. 

the two ends are done differently, but highlighted in layered glaze

Besides the lemon squeezers, I glazed some plates and mugs. The plates are all pretty small, but I'm fairly happy with the results. I layered the ochre glaze on one plate to create varied textures, and I think it instead looks a little messy, but the others are good. The blues, in particularly, look good in person.

small plates with mostly celadon glazes

Along with the lemon squeezers, I finally fired some mugs I had glazed last year some time. They sat, ready to fire, through the entire studio remodel, which started in about September of last year. 

mugs from last year with celadon glazes

My favorite of the mugs I fired are these two-colored mugs. They're more time consuming by far than the plates, but I like the pattern.

my favorite of the mugs, the red is a particularly lush color

New work at Artebella Gallery for International Sculpture Month

New work, April 2019, now on display at Artebella Gallery

April 27 is International Sculpture Day and there are several sculpture events going on in the Yakima area. Boxx Gallery in Tieton is having a sculpture show (I'll have an installation in this show) and there will be an associated community event in the square that day. And Mike Hiler is showing work at Oak Hollow Gallery.

New work, Summer 2018 (not on display at Artebella)

Artebella Gallery at 1111 Spruce Street, next to Taste and See Deli in Yakima is having some events, including artists talks and a display illustrating the process of lost wax casting. The gallery owner had contacted me earlier this year to ask for new work from me. 

New work 2018-2019

When she first contacted me, I told her I didn't have any new work, but then I realized I might have time to make something before April. So I actually got myself into the studio and made something new this winter. Of course when I went to pack up to take her the new piece and a few older pieces, I realized that I did have two or three new pieces from the summer that I had forgotten about.

New work, Winter 2019

I pulled the latest sculpture from the kiln Saturday morning. I had tried a combination of underglaze layers and cone 6 celadon glazes. I was trying to create a sense of thickness and color variation that was a bit more subtle than the underglazes on their own.

celadon on underglaze, detail

I fired the work in my small kiln, since I was firing so little, but the kiln didn't quite reach temperature. Regardless, I was pretty happy with the results fo the firing. The blue celadon has some mottled texture on the top bulb that is only evident when you look closely at the work.

I was trying to get away with not setting up a backdrop for photos. This is the result of my laziness.

I used a blue celadon over two layers of blue underglaze on the main body of the piece. I used the same blue celadon over two different types of blue underglaze on the bulbs and I like the similar texture and different color result. I used clear celadon over the orange and cinnamon underglaze on the sprigs.

Celadon over underglaze (and a small glaze fault)

 The results weren't perfect, however. Two of the bulbs have small dry spots after firing. It looks like I brushed up against the side of the piece after glazing, but I am sure this isn't what happened. The strange thing is that I underglazed the entire piece, then bisque it. Three coats of blue underglaze were applied the entire surface, then fired. After bisque firing I added the celadon. So for bare clay to show up, both the celadon and the underglaze came off during firing.

New work, Summer of 2018, on display at Artebella

I've had similar issue in the past when underglaze has peeled off of a pot after glaze firing. This has happened a couple of times in the last few years. I think the problem is the fit between the glaze or underglaze and the clay body. I have never seen this issue on a textured surface, only on a smooth, burnished surface. I don't remember every seeing it with underglaze alone, but it shows up as brittle pieces of glaze (with the underglaze attached) cracking off the surface, leaving no evidence of either glaze or underglaze on the raw ceramic below. 

New to the gallery work at Artebella

Luckily, on this piece the glaze faults were pretty tiny little spots, but I think I do need to do some research into this in the future (though the thought of doing this does not fill me with joy). This is also something I occasionally see in student work, so it is worth it to figure out the problem.

new to the gallery work at Artebella

If you'd like to see my new work, or slightly older work, including almost everything pictured in this post, stop by Artebella Gallery at 1111 W. Spruce in Yakima. Tomorrow I will be installing some political work at Boxx Gallery in Tieton. More on that in a future post.