Friday, February 8, 2008

Feeling grey.

Today I posted a few of my 1 lb. vases, this time made from grey porcelain. What do I do with all those carved and "contaminated" bits of fine white porcelain and black slip? Recycle them and make grey porcelain, of course. Now, I use colored porcelain on a regular basis with my sculptural work (which someday I'll go into on here) but it's rather expensive to make. If I made a vase out of bright orange porcelain I'd have to charge quite a bit and I don't think your average customer would understand the price. But consider the fact that my orange stain is $30/lb. and you also need WAY more stain in a clay body than in a glaze. Anyway, my grey is practically free when you think about it that way. And I must say that it is quite lovely. It does wonderful things with the glazes and it's always nice to change things up every once in a while. I've never been a fan of working with dark clay bodies but I think that bias is from working with the rough, groggy stoneware I had to use in college before learning to make my own clay...ugh, memories of finding sponge bits and sticky band-aids in the community buckets! So here are a few of my new vases. I particularly love the yellow over the grey which turns slightly green and the cobalt, which makes a lovely, super rich, navy blue. Not quite as graphic as the other work, but just as beautiful in their own way.


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