So these represent the best tiles I have fired in the last year, and include tests for brushwork and the saggar firing, there is so much variation and I have started to mount them in some new ways as I think these go beyond throw away objects.
For a while I have been thinking about tiles as an act of experimentation, they are something that can be created in the fraction of time for throwing, there is a lot less focus that goes into creating them, no hunching over the wheel. In some ways they are quite disposable.
I don’t generally use tile for glaze tests as they don’t have gravity and thickness’s similar to pots but I do use them to test ideas, patterns, new and more recently my saggars to see what effects are possible. In these sorts of ways the tiles are part of the experimentation and systematic testing that I was used to when I was a chemistry student many moons ago.
So this was my first test tile in a saggar, this actually gave me more confidence about saggar firing than any other piece in that kiln. it is mounted on a scrap piece of plywood that whitewashed and waxed. A lot of the wood I use for mounting and framing would otherwise just end up in landfill.I just love the marks shells leave on the honey glaze, and the horses tail leaves an amazing texture too. The round osb was cut because I wanted some more throwing batts but after I these ones I wasn’t sure they would last as batts so I decided to try this one for a mount and I quite like it due to it being so different.The marks just left by the shells and the reduction in my little kiln are amazing, I can’t help but stare at them. These were placed on top of each other so have the same shells but they appear reflected. The tile on the left has a porcelain slip which affects the colour too.These don’t fit this shadow box and I will make them a new frame in September. The frame was orriginally intended for the large tile above but was based on it shrinking from bisque to vitrified, but it was a few millimetres off so it doesn’t fit but it looks better with the two reflections. Moral of the story wait until you have finished work before building it a frame.I started working on my brush work last year but haven’t had much chance to get back to it in recent months, but cobaly markings and sgraffito are the only ways I can find that get around that feeling of my work not being reduction fired.I do like graduations in colour going from light to dark. The tile on the left is unglazed with porcelain slip and some flashing. The other two tiles have my honey glaze and varying amounts of local reduction.These are some older tests in a shadow frame that I made. The tiles are a homemade porcelain my standard clay with iron added and some commercial black clay. It is made from cutting down some pine that was in the bin pile, the problem is it was quite ugly. I was wrapping blue painters masking tape around it and I really liked the blue it seemed to tie everything together.A tile I made in 2012 to test sgraffito, high fired terracotta and a commercial white slip, with lustre for windows. In a shadow box frame.
These are my first attempts at framing and I want to do more, and I want to work a lot more in tiles. I also want to work more at creating my own clays. These so far really have my creative juices flowing.
In case you didn’t see it my new youtube mini-series started woodworking for potters
So what do you the reader like and have you ever framed your ceramic work?
So I was going through some pots in storage a few weeks ago and pulled out this lidded jar. It really caught my eye and I can’t stop looking at it, it is one of the last things I made before my youngest child was born. I have a feeling something similar to this will be on the cards again. They give a good variety of surfaces to carve, decorate and play with and I would like to get them into a saggar too, perhaps with a bit less decoration and let the saggar do all the work.
So this isn’t going to be an in-depth blog entry, as I spent the time I should have been doing that on sitting down and planning. You see things might be changing at the pottery soon and there will be a proper announcement when it happens. But cutting the story to a non existent tale I need to start taking the pottery seriously and actually try to build an audience. My priorities are taking some better photographs and need a better setup than I currently use. Actually trying to actively share my posts/YouTube videos further than my own social media.I…
A video posted by Joseph Travis (@redfoxpottery) on Aug 16, 2015 at 4:51am PDT Recently I keep trying to write about the work of Ayumi Horie, James Gurney, Austin Kleon and so on. But every piece I write becomes torrid and dry, or it becomes a gushing piece “they are amazing”, “aren’t they creative” or “aren’t they really driving their work on”. I once wrote a piece about how annoyed I was about a particular ceramics writer always started a piece of writing about where he had come across the makers work; it became 100% about him rather than about…
I have never been to see Winchcombe Pottery, so when I was visiting the Lighthearts earlier in July they suggested we should go on a trip there. In case you don’t know much about their history click here, needless to say Michael Cardew reopened the country pottery in 1926 with the help of Elijah Comfort and Sydney Tustin. It was then taken over by Ray Finch in 1946 and was run by him and his family until the last year. It is now run by Matt Grimmitt who is the Great Great Grandson of Elijah Comfort. Entering the pottery they…
For the uninitiated, I should explain what a Saggar is, it is a big piece of pottery that smaller pottery is sealed in. Traditionally this was done in Stoke on Trent to protect the pottery from the coal fire that they fired their kilns with. Modern Potters use them to get a reduction environment inside an electric kiln, this stops the kiln from getting damaged and brings some different effects to the pots. I threw a a saggar a few years ago and it has been sat on the top shelf on my studio for a few years now, not…
Patia Davies film on making buttons shows a real sense of rhythm to life and the processes she is going through. The video isn’t a video of a teacher standing in front of a class and doesn’t stop to explain. For someone with a background in making there is a lot she is teaching and a lot to learn. We see in this video there is efficiency to making buttons as they are a by-product of making platters.
2 Comments
tiles are useful as glaze tests etc,but as you’ve found can be framed and sold (Hannah and Doug do this too) or even used at home…as tiles!
I made a concious decision to make bigger tiles the older tiles are 6cm square and aren’t much use as they are thin and very wonky. I made a mould like Doug and Hannah but the test one I made I just don’t like it bounces every which way when I try and use it.
I have thought about using them as tiles but can’t produce the quantity and the quality isn’t where I want it yet.
tiles are useful as glaze tests etc,but as you’ve found can be framed and sold (Hannah and Doug do this too) or even used at home…as tiles!
I made a concious decision to make bigger tiles the older tiles are 6cm square and aren’t much use as they are thin and very wonky. I made a mould like Doug and Hannah but the test one I made I just don’t like it bounces every which way when I try and use it.
I have thought about using them as tiles but can’t produce the quantity and the quality isn’t where I want it yet.