Daddy wants a pugmill!!!

I must admit as an undergrad I was never really aware of all the behind the scenes work that went into clay prep. Getting it just right for the unaware college student took a great deal of time in mixing and recycling, much of which was probably done by hard working grad students. But at least they had access to top notch working equipment. Oh, I am sure this was necessary as the amount of clay was huge but the use of the equipment made the work easier.
My bane as a potter is keeping clay in a good state to be used for throwing. I have several hundred bags of clay that I use for slabs and other handbuilding pieces, but it is a pain to throw with. I must do a lot to get it to the right consistency. Wedging and kneading helps, but it slows down production and wears out my wrists

This year I have been recycling my scrap and that makes the best throwing consistency. I slake down my bone dry scraps in water for a few days and blunge mix them up ...

This process is followed by what we potters call 'bat drying'. The clay slip is allowed to sit for a couple of days in the tub where water is skimmed off the top to get a thicker slop like thickness. I then pour out half gallon size amounts on to plaster bats to dry overnight. Here they are on top of my slab table.

Bonsai Pottery: three ovals

Here are some pots from the last run, a double kiln load:

a small oval with the same glaze combo as the last post,

 a cracked oval about the same size but with different colors,

and this last one I am quite happy with. I like the way the glaze line falls down onto the stain and textured area.

 Thanks for viewing!

Thanks M^6 Glazes

This rectangle was stained and glazed with glazes found in the book Mastering Cone Glazes, by John Hesselberth and Ron Roy. In the book there are many delightful glaze recipes. The one on this pot is a mixture of two blues, one light and the other of a medium value. It is a great book. I highly recommend it.

Simple elegance

This medium sized oval has a nice understated quality about it. In this photo the color is a bit greenish rather than yellow. I wanted to get some slight color variation by using a sporadic layering of white underglaze. This technique calls for more practice and experimentation to get what I want to achieve in the final result.

Enjoy...

Soft rectangle treatment

This rectangle shows texture and stain and wabi sabi feet. It was fun to make and I am currently drying several more similar to this one. Its a bit tricky to make the round wall into a true rectangular shape so I made some special boards to help with the form alteration. I got the idea from another bonsai potter's website photos a couple of years ago. He is the true American master bonsai potter. Thank you Ron!

Love that dark clay!

Here are three pieces from my last batch using a high shrinkage dark claybody. I understand that the dark color comes from manganese and dark ball clay. I stain it with iron on the bisque to give it an even darker color than it already has. It is the closest clay that I can find to match the fine Tokoname look that is used for exhibition bonsai.

Lovely intermingling

I was unloading my pots from my last firing and noticed an interesting interplay of two glazes. The bottom glaze has a stoney matt surface texture. I brushed on a couple of coats of a ^6 glossy base glaze over the rim and wasn't quite sure of the end result. In other words I didn't make a test tile of this first, but it worked better than expected. If you look closely you can see the interesting small rivulets that caught my eye...

Enjoy-

Two for Smitty

These two pieces were made for Steven in the Orlando club. The first is a carved drum using a very dark plastic clay. It was stained and fired to a hard^6. It has a bit of wabi sabi character in it.

The next pot is a medium sized shallow oval using the Floating Blue glaze that I have been experimenting with. Although the picture doesn't do it justice, there are small swirls of blue and bits of texture popping from the granular ilmenite that I mixed into this particular claybody.

Crackle toast anyone?

These are some of the last group from this month. The first pot features a white crackle trim over a Red Iron Oxide wash. I decided to set the wash over it first, so I ended up bisquing twice before its final ^6 fire.

Octagon and Hex!

These two geometric pots are done using slabs. This hexagon features a speckled satin glaze. It measures 10" across.

Here is a large octagon that measures 14" across. I used an albany slip glaze with white highlights.

Same pots, different colors

Here are two soft rectangles, both about the same medium size. The first is stained in a Red Iron Oxide wash, the second is glazed with a turquoise satin color. I would like to work more on bringing out some depth with darker color in the recesses. Perhaps adding another glaze color to change it up a bit.

To be continued...

August heat...

I spent about a grand getting electricity out to my shed so I now have a true kiln shed! This is much better than having my kiln in my garage where it was previously. Lets just say it was too hot! Although I am still saving up for a larger kiln, I am pleased with this last batch.

Here are a couple ovals:

I'm melting!!!!!

This pot reminds me of snow melting. I'll call this a happy accident. Although it was not what I intended to happen, I do like the result!

Enjoy Louise!

Oxblood blues...

Here are a few tiles from my last red Oxblood recipe. I had to fire it twice to get more red to come out. Although its not too strong of a glaze color (red) it really needs a slower cool down to be more effective as a red glaze.

I will need to try again when I purchase my electronic controlled kiln later this year.