Hot Pots
I fired a kiln full of pots last week in the soda kiln. It was chock full of cups, but that's the subject of another blog post. It was a pretty fun load. There were a couple of new clay bodies, new glazes and slips. Lots of testing and playing around led to many late late nights at the studio in preparation for this kiln. I ended up with was about a kiln and a half full of work, so there will be another one soon!
This is what the back of the kiln looked like before the firing:
And this is what it looked like after:
The back third of the kiln is usually has less soda than the front. I load porcelain or white stoneware clay bodies in the back of the kiln that do nice things with less soda to take advantage of this area. If I try to put my soda body in the back of the kiln it will be rough and dry. Not a nice look. I also load the kiln more loosely to encourage the flame to head back there.
And this is the front of the kiln before:
And this is it after:
The kiln had mixed results for me. The pieces that I'm excited about I am really excited about. The ones that did not turn out so well are disappointments. But that is why I do soda. I'd much rather have the highs be really high and the lows be really low than to fire a kiln and say "oh, that's just how I thought they'd turn out." And when you have a kiln that you're doing lots of experimenting with, those extremes are even more extreme. There will be lots of pictures to come, but I thought I'd give you a peak and some of the cups.
Please excuse my less than excellent pictures. I snapped them quickly in my studio last night as the sun was going down. Snazzy pictures will come in the not too distant future. I want to get better images of the test pieces so you can really see what's going on.
peace - hope - change
And this is a little preview of some new pieces to come:
(I love this new clay body!)
The image below is of the wall of the soda kiln. Isn't it beautiful? The walls are actually glazed. I'll write more about this soon, but basically the idea is to glaze the walls of the kiln to help protect the bricks from the soda and to pre-season the kiln so less soda can be used from the first firing.
This is what the back of the kiln looked like before the firing:
And this is what it looked like after:
The back third of the kiln is usually has less soda than the front. I load porcelain or white stoneware clay bodies in the back of the kiln that do nice things with less soda to take advantage of this area. If I try to put my soda body in the back of the kiln it will be rough and dry. Not a nice look. I also load the kiln more loosely to encourage the flame to head back there.And this is the front of the kiln before:
And this is it after:
The kiln had mixed results for me. The pieces that I'm excited about I am really excited about. The ones that did not turn out so well are disappointments. But that is why I do soda. I'd much rather have the highs be really high and the lows be really low than to fire a kiln and say "oh, that's just how I thought they'd turn out." And when you have a kiln that you're doing lots of experimenting with, those extremes are even more extreme. There will be lots of pictures to come, but I thought I'd give you a peak and some of the cups.
Please excuse my less than excellent pictures. I snapped them quickly in my studio last night as the sun was going down. Snazzy pictures will come in the not too distant future. I want to get better images of the test pieces so you can really see what's going on.
I love how the pattern accentuates the form on these:
peace - hope - changeAnd this is a little preview of some new pieces to come:
(I love this new clay body!)
