Week 8 Spring 2024

This week was spent on a lot of research and exploring what realm i'd like to inhabit with my crystalline forms. My mom took a trip to South Korea and gave me the opportunity of seeing some of their surface decorations present on decorative pots in the hotel she was staying in. I am preparing to fire an assortment of cups with white and black interiors to see how the glaze performs on an actual form. I have also discovered better firing schedules for some of the glazes and how they react. It is very interesting how the different colorants can change the growth of the crystals even when the same base recipe is used.

This was a firing schedule with a 4 hour hold at degrees F. It went up to temperature slowly and then only had one ramp on the down end. It produced a small amount of non fully formed crystals.

This firing schedule included 8 ramps and holds and went straight up to cone 10 with 7 holds on the back end varying up and down in crystal growing temperature.

After a few firings that didn't produce crystals, I got this test cup to grow crystals but because the thickness of the glaze on top was not as thick as it needed to be it pinholed and didn't produce crystals along the top rim.

Check back next week for more! I have a few cups to go into the kiln and hopefully they will perform better with a thicker glaze coat.