I work with a medium grit, lowfire clay body which comes in 25 pound blocks. This particular clay allows me to achieve the results I want in regards to the many textures I integrate into my designs.
Each of my ceramic sculptures is a handbuilt original.
They are all built and fired as one piece and then left to dry for anywhere from a few days to a few weeks depending upon the size of the piece and, believe it or not, the weather.
The pieces must be bone dry before they are loaded into the kiln and fired for the first time. This firing takes approximately 15 hours. The pieces are heated slowly allowing for any excess moisture to be released and preventing the clay from blowing up in the kiln. They are also cooled slowly preventing breakage from thermal shock. This firing is called a bisque firing and when they are done and cooled they are ready to be glazed.
The Glazes
I use a variety of low fire glazes glazes on my pieces.
These glazes allow me to have a very large and diverse range of colors to choose from when glazing.
They are applied to the fired pieces with a paintbrush and require 3 coats before they are fired. This firing goes somewhat faster than the bisque firing because the pieces can now be heated faster. After this firing most of the pieces are finished however , there is a third firing which some of the pieces go through called an overglaze firing. This is where a specialty glaze is applied which gives results such as a gold or silver finish or a mother of pearl finish.
