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Qotw: Do You Tend To End Up Using The Same General Color Schemes In Your Glaze Work Intentionally Or Unintentionally?


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The Question of the Week this week comes from yappystudent, a newer member of the forum who hails from Idaho. The question comes from the pinned strand, participants pool, in the Potters Council Operations and Benefits section. . . Please participate in this pool. Her question is:

Do you tend to end up using the same general color schemes in your glaze work intentionally or unintentionally? (I do. It's various whites over dark clays, usually with the speckles coming through.)

 

I have a tendency to work with earth tones-Cream, white, browns, blues and greens. I admire Copper Reds, and have experimented with local reduction, but not the same. I also like purples, and have some recipes that will go in that direction. As I have been working on a medium dark clay body(hazelnut) of late, the purple looks too dirty on it without a white slip or glaze underneath it. I will be working on a white stoneware soon, and hope that this will shake up the glazes once more, as the change to hazelnut did.

 

best,

Pres

 

 

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Yes and intentional.

 

My favorite colors fall into a pretty small range. And for a professional, it pays to have a recognizable "look" to your work. You can achieve this is various ways, doesn't have to be with a glaze palette, but a strong and consistent glaze approach is never a bad idea.

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I asked a mentor friend that same question a few years back.  I told her I noticed that professional potters seemed to have a specific palette of color.  It does make sense.  When I was starting out I wanted to try every glaze color in the rainbow.  It has taken me a while to land on certain colors that I like and gravitate towards. Like Mea pointed out it gives you a recognizable look, and the opportunity to really fine tune your clay/glaze.  If you know your glazes, and how they fire and what they do on your clay body, you are not spending extra time on mixing and testing.  I think there will always be some of that, but for me, it's been a matter of really focusing on glazes that behave well and that are appealing.

 

Roberta

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So far I've been throwing spaghetti to the ceiling to see what sticks. My glazes are all commercial, mostly ^6. I am slowly moving away from the traditional-looking browns (ex. Bronze Temmoku). I generally only work on white stoneware or porcelain-the porcelain often stays unglazed or with just clear, or maybe clear and a small splash of one color, like blue. I do like some of the "effect" glazes like Crystal Forest, Blue Rutile, and Texas Two-Step Oil Spot (the combo of a red/magenta-ish base with black specks). I don't particulary care for pastels or use underglazes much, at this time. I like cream fractal base under or over something. Right now, for color, Lapis Satin is one of my favorites. My testing is more along the lines of experimenting, so I'm buying whatever is appealing to me when I have some spendoolies for something new--collecting a variety so I can settle on a few, down the road.  

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Thanks for re-posting my question!

Since the original posting I've also discovered I really like the way certain vivid primary colors and bright white underglazes look when "They didn't turn out" (in the words of the ppl who fire my jewelry) and take on a velvety finish over Cassius black clay body. Definitely debating the tests I've done so far as a signature look but I've yet to try many ideas.

Also I bought some small jars of "Shimmer" glazes that come out looking nothing like they are supposed to yet some are making very original 'edgy' pastel effects speckled with what looks like black sparkly mica. I've been wearing a pair of earring beads I colored with this and getting lots of nice comments.

Still really like the white speckled glazes over dark clay best for the vessels I do.

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the pots in the gallery here show that green is the most frequently used color.  because i work with natural leaves, green seems obvious.  i also sell smaller pieces and use lots of colors on them, mostly so my display does not look TOTALLY  green.   i even used orange , really the color of an orange, on some cats.  yes, cats can come in marmalade orange but these are intense orange.  i never expect to sell them, but they make a great break for eyes looking at green.

 

one design is from a plastic doily with tiny lines.  i make coaster size plates and color them pink, pale blue, crimson, mazerine blue, purple,  bright yellow and .....orange.

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Yes and intentional.

Like Mea I have a line of work-Its got a bit of wide latitude as the colors and combos are changing over time with some constant colors.

​the main theme is BRIGHT COLORS.

​You could have bought a mug from me in the 80;s and still be able to match it well enough today.Materials change as do the colors over time to some degree but generally they still look close enough.

​Making a line of work for many decades one tries to keep parts alike. I need variety to live  and keep fresh so I'm always adding to that line with glazes.

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I think so. I love color, so I love the runny blues with maroons in there. The Amaco Potter's Choice glazes, theynlook somewhat like the Chun at cone 10, but much easier.

I also love very bright colors, so I use a lot of underglazes and carving, which is new to me.

Ah, color.

post-6053-0-53716900-1493721044_thumb.jpg

post-6053-0-60171200-1493721107_thumb.jpg

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Yes and intentional.

Like Mea I have a line of work-Its got a bit of wide latitude as the colors and combos are changing over time with some constant colors.

​the main theme is BRIGHT COLORS.

​You could have bought a mug from me in the 80;s and still be able to match it well enough today.Materials change as do the colors over time to some degree but generally they still look close enough.

​Making a line of work for many decades one tries to keep parts alike. I need variety to live  and keep fresh so I'm always adding to that line with glazes.

I LOVE your colors! I just don't reduction fire. I have started using Amaco Potter's Choice, which has some gorgeous results.

Nancy

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Guest JBaymore

With a couple of exceptions, I've been working with the same basic palate of glazes for nigh on to 40 years here in NH.  Instead of being constraining, I find it gives me a huge range of possibilities and sets some "structure" to the work.  The decision to do this this way was very conscious and done a long time ago.  Working with the same glazes a long time allows me to "know" them pretty well.  The palate itself reflects the aesthetic that I am striving to produce.

 

Like Mark mentioned above... if someone asked me to do a new piece for them that is similar in glaze to something that they bought from me 30 years ago... I could hit that pretty closely. 

 

Matching clay body is the far more difficult one.... because the raw materials for the clay bodies I used 30 and 40 years ago are (sadly) gone, gone, gone.  I sorely miss real Jordan Stoneware clay, PBX Fireclay, Pine Lake Fireclay, and more recently the REAL (old) A.P.Green Dry-Milled Fireclay. 

 

Glazes................. An iron saturate tenmoku.  An iron red "kaki" (persimmon).  A "runny" wood ash grey-green that is from local materials.  An American Shino recipe that I developed.  An Oribe style green.  A chun-like opal blue.  A synthetic nuka (rice HUSK ash type).  A real nuka (recipe I got from Hamada) for special pieces (mainly tea wares and sake wares).  A Karatsu-like semi-gloss gray that takes iron brushwork well. 

 

Add to this above the possibilities of yakishime (unglazed) natural ash glaze from woodfire, and also the impacts of fly ash WITH the above glazes.

 

Also overglaze enamels in red, green, yellow, teal blue, lavender, black, and white.   

 

Also gold luster in burnish gold and bright gold.

 

Just last year I started to experiment with a combination of two cone 10 reduction glazes that we have been using at the college for a good while that I kind of like together.  That will be the first addition in a LONG time.  That combo is Rhodes Black (a semi-gloss opaque black combined with Burton's Yellow (a semi-matte high calcium iron yellow) then combined with some blood red overglaze enamel.  I only have a couple of years on limited testing with it so far..... but I think it will likely "stick".  I had one piece with this combo on it in my recent solo exhibition.

 

best,

 

.....................john

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Although I am often trying a new glaze, I do work, glaze, in color groups so that when I set up a display it looks planned, not random, 2nd hand store looking. I will glaze several larger pieces and lots of smaller in about 4 different colors for a set up at a show. Next show may have different colors. but still in the blue green brown range. I will plan a set of pieces with the same design and glaze and do that in 2-3 different glazes.

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I want to end up with the same color scheme. Right now I don't have one and I am trying to find it. It will most likely be some versions of black, grey, white, and a copper glaze or two. I just love the variety of copper as an ingredient. 

 

I am still a while from settling down on a few glazes. I am getting close and closer though each year.

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When I was wrorking cone 10 reduction, I deliberately limited myself to 5 glazes, because I wanted to really explore everything that they could do together. That whole set yourself some limits and explore heavily within that range sort of philosophy.

Since I started working at cone 6 and using a lot of underglaze decoration, I spent the last year building a line of work that does have some cohesion when you see it all together, especially since I'm trying to get to a place where I can pay some bills with my work. I'm not completely happy with it yet, and I've found that I'm really missing a level of depth and subtlety that I was "raised" with, so I'm engaging in some testing again. Hopefully I can get my pallet down to those five glazes again at some point. The number of yogurt containers in my studio is kind of out of control right now.

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The number of yogurt containers in my studio is kind of out of control right now.

 

I hear ya. I disposed of over 300 containers, the 400ML ones you buy at the dollar store. Get a pack of 5 for a dollar. Over the course of 3 years, you can get a stupid amount of test going.

 

I need to send you a message about underglaze decoration. Doing that now.

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The number of yogurt containers in my studio is kind of out of control right now.

 

 

I hear ya. I disposed of over 300 containers, the 400ML ones you buy at the dollar store. Get a pack of 5 for a dollar. Over the course of 3 years, you can get a stupid amount of test going.

 

I need to send you a message about underglaze decoration. Doing that now.

i have kids. They eat a. Lot. Of. Yogurt.

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Doing crystalline glaze does get to be frustrating at times: color wise. I have ran somewhere in the 800-900 range of various oxide combos trying to produce unique colors. At the end of the day, they always seem to produce shades of brown, blue, and green.  I do have an orange, purple, and a few other oddities: a nice break.

 

Nerd

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