Ceramic sculpture - Spring '08

Here is what I've done so far for the first half of the semester in Ceramics (sculpture). In class, we are given assignments to give us an overview of techniques (for building and for the finishes/coloring/glazing). The finish used is in parentheses after the project name.

Mask project (smoked):

A simple design of a mask in sections, with a very smooth surface, and using a very smooth type of clay (not grainy). We let them dry, put on slip (either brick red or off-white colors), polished them, fired them in a kiln, then "smoked" them for the appearance of a smoked finish.

Below, I'm smoking the large part of my "monkey" mask. I smelled like BBQ after this. But love the way my mask smells smokey now!

Puppet project (Raku):

Raku is an ancient Japanese pottery technique of which you have no control over the outcome of the glazed finishes. The dried and glazed pieces are put in an outside kiln for a short time to open the pores, then removed when extremely hot and placed in trash cans. The cans are full of newspaper and other types of shavings, which catch fire from the hot pieces. The cans are covered and left to work chemistry magic. The pieces are then pulled out and hosed off, exposing the interesting outcomes. The more contact with the carbon that is generated, the more effects the glazes will get - such as metallic or crackle finishes - depending on the types of glazes used. You can also use the same glaze and get completely different results (i.e. different colors or metallic). There's no control of the finishes, so it's all a surprise ending!

My puppet is a combination of my own contemporary designed African animal parts. A Zebra head, with a Giraffe body, lion arms/paws, Ostrich legs, and an Elephant tail. I wanted to create something unique, simple, with a tribal touch, and experiment with the different Raku glazes.

Here I am covered in gear about to unload the HOT pieces from the kiln to place them in trash cans full of newspaper shavings:

Grabbing a piece with the tongs:

My finished wall puppet:The Giraffe body was all the same glaze, but most of it received "high reduction" and the removal of oxygen from the flames and newspapers, so left the copper and textured look. The head is called "white crackle" and was like putting on a clear crackle coating over the clay. So, the white is the clay showing through, while the black lines are the carbon from the fire and papers filling in the cracks. Another glaze was used for the arms, but one arm received more reduction than the other, turning it green with black paw pads, while the other is reddish/orange/brown with grey paw pads. The legs were painted the same glaze as the body called "Lizard Skin," but didn't get as much reduction to become as metallic, but they do have an iridescent shimmer to them in person. The tail came out as a solid blueish gray using another glaze. I connected all the pieces afterwards with wire. They already had the hooks inserted when they were built.

From the Raku process, a clump that looks like rough white-ish "poop" showed up on one of the legs, behind the heel (you can see it on the right leg in photo)...so I'll keep it there. How perfect! A happy accident.

Coil project (Sgraffito):

We had to build an upwards sculpture using the coiling technique, which automatically makes the piece hollow (and we don't have the removal of excess clay from the interior later). After coiling the shape, we had to smooth out the exterior since we were doing a carved finish called Sgraffito. We chose from black or brick-red colored slips to paint on the leather hard clay piece and then carved away drawings or patterns on the piece. By carving, the colored slip is removed, leaving the clay exposed for the drawing, also with 3-D texture - depending on how deep and wide the carving was done. Once fired, the slip will become a richer color and the clay will be a cream color.

I decided to do a simple interpretation of a dolphin (this is the front end) and I ended up tattooing its whole body by carving ocean scenes all over it. In my own mix of abstract and realism, there are animals, various ocean life, plant life, shells, and water movement. Once it's completely fired, I'll post more images in a later post and the carvings will show up better to get a closer look - since there's a lot going on and many animals and shells need to be looked for.

The photos below are after the carving, before the firing - since it's in the process of firing now. The black slip appears grey and the carvings are hard to see well in the images - since there isn't much contrast at this stage. But don't forget that you can click on any image to enlarge them and go back using your browser's back button. I'm posting them the largest I can.