This is NOT a Test

Clay is a fickle lover. Popped the top on the SECOND glaze firing… yes, I tried refiring my sgraffito trays/wall tiles thinking I could smooth out the milky-splotchyness of the matt glaze. I had a bit of varied results on the whole load. Couldn’t pinpoint what exactly the issue may be but I was disappointed in most of the pieces. I was hoping for better results considering I used the utmost patience –for me anyways! I THOUGHT, I mixed enough, brushed on enough and let dry enough, even had the kiln controller set to the correct schedule and cone temp of ^05 and even waited beyond the cool down to open the lid. I’m learning (the hard way) that working with clay, you can’t test enough. I’ve admired all the testing Judy Shreve, of Mountain House Studios, has been doing on her Terra Sig journey. Tracey Broome has taught me a lot with her glazing pinhole issues and I admired her for continuing to forge ahead. Reading each post and seeing her photos I could totally identify with the building frustration with each exhaustive round of troubleshooting. It doesn't seem

fair to have a perfectly beautiful piece be ruined at a final stage of firing on a technicality. Clay artists should be able to have a do-over, or some sort of warning flag or digital message that gets sent to us WAY before you open the kiln to disappointment. I know, I know, then we wouldn’t be working in C L A Y –ha!

Above, the Heart tray/tile (used the Amaco Matte glaze) did come out pleasing enough, as well as the small Leaf w/handle tray (used the Coloramics Soft Matte glaze) but the others were not uniform, and on a couple of pieces the black underglaze was altered (the sunflower and Raven Moon pieces being the worse -below). I used two different glazes, the

most successful glaze used was the Coloramics NM-450 Clear Soft Matte, made by Mayco, the other glaze was a Transparent Matte LM-10 by Amaco. The Coloramics only needed two coats and brushed on much nicer than the Amaco. Really none of the pieces using the Amaco Matt Liquid Matte glaze turned out well. A positive was the brightness and true colors (red, yellow, blue and black) of the Duncan E-Z Strokes Underglazes, I love those. Trust me, I’m not totally blaming the material, this seems to be more artist-operator error.

Either the kiln temp/schedule not being quite right (it did fire quick and under 5 hours), glaze too thick, not thick enough or not properly mixed. The good news is I have more sgraffito trays/wall tiles on the drying rack and the Coloramics glaze that I had success with, I have more of. I used up all of the Amaco Mate, so this next batch I’ll use all Coloramics, Clear Soft Matte. I will admit that even with a bit of disappointment, I still don’t think I’m EVER going to be one of those artists that will make tons of tiny test tiles and fire load after load of test firings. Especially since I have a STACK of those smallish tiles, I made over a year ago sitting on the bisque shelf... I’m one of those artists that will just be giving friends and family all my seconds (and thirds) for every conceivable Holiday. Spoiler Alert; Mom, your birthday is this month!!

Share and Tell

This year, I have made an effort to buy thoughtful holiday gifts that are either handmade or support good causes. Blogging has been a wonderful benefit to connect with artisans I might not have otherwise known about. Two, really fun packages arrived last week. First, my friend Marjorie of Cowgirl Goods helped me to purchase these beautiful felted sculptures I Blogged about this weekend. Aren’t they wonderful?! When I first saw felted goats on Marjorie’s Blog I knew immediately who I wanted to give them to for Christmas (I can't say who because she reads my Blog)! I actually had them wrapped up but UNwrapped them because so many of the fiber artists from Art Coffee wanted to see them. The artist who makes them is Marilyn Pratt from Maine and she is 80 years old. Marjorie told me that Marilyn’s booth at this weekend's Women’s Holiday Art Sale in Berwick Maine, was swamped with customers clamoring for her felted sculptures. Lucky for me Marjorie was my long distance personal shopper. The coolest part of all this is that the wool on the sculptures comes mainly from one of Marjorie’s Navajo Churo Sheep named Vera!

The second special package that arrived was from Julia at Henhouse Pottery. I knew from following her Blog that Julia and her family lived on an acre and a half in a cool 100-year old house with a bunch of animals, including thousands of bees. What I also learned was that Julia harvests and sells their All Natural honey they collect from their hives under the name Wilkins Honey. My golden gifts arrived with a beautiful, full color card describing their love of bees and how they get their honey. “We are small, non-commercial beekeepers who keep bees because we love them and care about preserving the honey bee population in Utah. Our bee’s artisan honey is a wonderful by-product of our symbiotic and respectful relationship with our insects, and we are delighted to be able to share it with you.” Thank you Julia for sharing your lifestyle, your process and your harvest, because now I have 5 (well, actually 4, because we opened a honey bear up in Girdwood to have on our fresh, hot biscuits!) more wonderful gifts to give and share!

And speaking of sharing… Sophia’s Dad is one smart cookie! Jim suggested that I Google the names of the mystery glazes and see if any of them pop up. And guess what?! They ALL did, exactly as they are named on the buckets! I found them listed on Sheffield Pottery’s web site. So far it appears that this group of glazes are “Cone 6 Opulence Glazes.” I don’t think I can use my test tiles (?) on this cone 6 glaze because they were only bisque fired at only ^ 04. Probably just as well because I’m also going to take Meredith and Ang’s advice and switch to a ^6, higher firing clay for my sculpture work. Thanks potters for all your sound and expert advice!

Great Glaze Mystery

Hard to believe, but I think I’m caught up and happy. Sorry but I had to Blog about it and I know with Holiday shopping and art making for all the upcoming shows, most of you are a bit envious. Without a heap of work needing to be welded up I was able to enjoy Art Coffee yesterday a bit longer than normal –the pictures are of some of the artists who attended our gathering at Middle Way Café. We had a record turnout and a few new faces. Art Coffee is an informal gathering of independent artists who meet to share, Grinch or crow about all topics relating to life & art. A few of the highlights were announcing all the First Friday openings last night including the new Upstairs Studio grand opening. Spearheaded by my friend and painter, Katie Sevigny (who has endless energy and is also a partner in Fiddlehead Gallery) the new Upstairs Studio is a large upstairs space at 416 G Street featuring the work of 10 local artists who have their working studio spaces with a large common gallery area that is totally HIP and has Katie’s touch written all over it! The GAGA’s (Garage Art Girls Alliance) Linda Warford passed around beautiful post card mailers and announced her group had an art opening and reception at Snow City Café. Half Moon Creek Gallery –my Gallery of choice, celebrated their 7^th anniversary last night with plenty of new works and a celebration at 510 W. Tudor. Another friend, Mary Hertert shared her new location for Color Creek Fiber Art at the corner of 36^th and Arctic. I congratulated her on her “Wasp Bride” being accepted in the Earth Fire & Fiber Exhibit at the Museum! My footloose and fancy-free schedule yesterday allowed me to visit her in her new space and get fired up about doing some felting –which is all Marjorie’s fault. All pretty cool and I’ll Blog about that next week after I take some pictures and get my laptop back…

With the studio table cleared of metal sculptures, I’ve finally had some brain space for clay. There’s been too long of a break since my last firing and my supplies are low. I did pull out these buckets of glaze I bought off of Cr@igs list for only $30. Short story long is that the person who was selling the glaze was a friend of a friend who was being transferred and the selling friend had no idea what cone temp the glazes were and needed the buckets out of her garage. She didn’t really even know what the glazes were used for… the other problem was I felt I had to purchase the buckets of glaze after the friend of a friend’s, DAD actually drove them off of the Air Force base and met me at the front gate (after Daddy-O and I had an hour wait) to show them to me because I couldn’t get on Base to take a look at them… Sooooo, not to have them go to waste, my thought was to just use some of my test tiles (in the photo above) I made and fire the glazes at maybe a ^04?? Some of the names on the buckets are Satin White, Smokey Mt. Mist, Sea Spray, Galaxy, Autumn Frost, Antique Iron, Blue Monday, Eggshell, Calico and Paprika -any of these sound familiar to anyone? I hate to NOT use them if I can figure out what cone they are as I’m currently glaze poor. BTW, I should admit that I really dislike glazing! My larger clay goal is to settle on ONE type of stoneware(?) clay, maybe something tan/gold/brownish with a bit of grog for my slab work and sculptures -any suggestions? I don't do any wheel throwing and I have two large electric kilns that have an electronic controller. I need to start fireing higher than ^04-05 and also know that I need to start using larger quantities of glaze so I can DIP and start mixing my own instead of the high priced commercial quart sizes I've been buying. What do my potter friends think?

Ahhhhh-laska! The Vernal Equinox

We may not have any crocus or daffodils popping up like at Mom & Dad's, but Spring in Alaska is still beautiful. The days are finally longer now. Last night walking Tauzer-Schnauzer the sun was shining and reflecting off Chester Creek, near our house. People were out, happy to be walking, skate-skiing and jogging on the Anchorage Coastal Trail. The daylight has brought a much needed attitude adjustment and people along the trail actually said hello to us! The high was still a brisk 29 degrees BUT, the sunrise was at 7:59 am and the Sunset was 8:15 pm, for total daylight hours of 12 hours, 16 minutes -yipee, we made it!!!

The glaze firing went well. A couple of

experiments worked and I was pleased with the matte glaze on two of the "Woobie Souls," pictured here. Though my glazing skills are still not that great, and in all hon

esty there may be a serious lack of "glaze desire" on my part. A gloss, dark blue (Speedball commercial glaze) doesn't look as good as the matte finishes. When I use the matte finishes, their velvety finish makes you 

want to hold and gently rub the bodies of the sculptures. Their softness lends the piece a quietness and overall subtlety that I wanted to convey.  The glossy, shiny glaze, in my opinion looks too reflective, slick and bright. I do like that Blue Speedball gloss glaze on some of the Sea Tiles. Everything was fast glaze fired at ^04. The real Blog news is that I finally got to try the ceramic laser decals today! I have a few test peices in the kiln RIGHT NOW -I'll post the process as soon as I can safely pop the lid on the kiln...

Good friends, food and coffee

Art Coffee was this morning. I’m feeling refreshed and inspired after a morning with other like-minded creative types. Several of us independent artists regularly get together for a morning of casual conversation about upcoming shows, art trends, studio troubles, new projects, gallery business news and of course coffee (I also had eggs benedict...mmm). New people come and go, and there can be as few as three, to as many as 10. I usually get to meet someone new whom I may have heard their name, and get a chance to put a face to the name/medium at Art Coffee. Mary and I usually feel the need for Art Coffee about the same time, every 2 weeks or so. Working on your own can feel isolating at times so we pick a morning at our favorite coffee shop cafe, send out an e-mail and ask to forward it to other like-minded creative types. Today we had a couple of fiber artists, a bead artist, painter, fused glass artist, encaustic artist, ATC artist, metal artist and ceramicist.

Unloaded the glaze load and had nice results for a beginner! The hardest part was that it took a lot of patience for me NOT to open the lid and peak before the kiln had properly cooled!

It was an electric ^05 firing. I tried out several new glazes, Amaco matt, as well as some new Speedball (not sure I like the Speedball but LOVE the Amaco matt). I also used some ancient Raku Crackle white and Copper Lustre...all not too bad. My scrifitto fish turned out way too shiny/glossy for my taste so I ordered some new clear matt glaze.

The picture on the right is of a small wall sculpture layout I want to make using the combination of steel and clay. I'm going to rust patina the metal and use copper wire to connect the clay components. The shell is a giant Alaska scallop I got in Homer this summer, along with the starfish (from my treasure box), using press molds Bill and I made this summer. I think I will be dong a similar sculpture for the fish and a few of the tiles. I like the combination of the steel and clay.

My Private Octogon Ocean

At 21 below zero I was better prepared for the extreme cold and had a warm kiln day! The metal work is going to have to wait until it is at least a balmy 10 above or even zero degrees. It is just way to miserable wearing my respirator and fogging my eye protection with my own breath or having my nose run inside of my welding helmet.

The bisque load I so patiently waited for turned out beautiful. Whew! My New Year’s goal of seeking “Nature’s patience” paid off. I was so tempted to lift the lid of the kiln early and take a peek, but I forced myself back into the studio to make some more fish and clay Shine-a-rellas that are now on the drying racks. The pictures are of the clay sea scape tiles with some of my Nature elements in the background. When I got to the last shelf, the fish looked like my private octagon ocean. The rough scriffito technique on the fish pair was my first attempt. I love the look but the sound and feeling of the marking through the glaze is uncomfortable for me to feel and hear…not sure what I’m going to do about that. One of the first pieces I formed was “Tired Old Moon.” I’m not sure how I am going to finish him but I’m so glad he survived the firing. There are several test tiles that I want to experiment with before I decide how to finish Mr. Moon.