Joseph Fireborn

lidded jar

Fired to ^6, Bee mix 5, Amoco Celadon C-53 and C-43, Base glaze from Mastering ^6 with 10% Zircopax. I call it Precious White.

Light grey clay, fine grog 25%, finished with ordinary acryllic paint (didn't want to spoil my first nice results with beginners glazing mistakes...)

The only good garden ornament is a dead one.

new slabroller extension and cleaning up the excess that had collected on the back table makes studio neater and easier to use. additional drywall sheets added on new tabletop storage rack adds 1/3 more space for finished work waiting for firing. there are 4 of the closet organizers, each with ten shelves of drywall. only 2 drawers with supplies, all the rest are drywall approx 18x24 inches.  except for lizard poop,  studio stays surprisingly clean.

Using rare earth oxides in conjunction with cobalt and glaze modifiers.

Overglaze test... soul

These two are my favorites out of the set of mugs I have just created.

The white is the overlap between the two. A kiln-assist student thought many of my slab works were cookies, and carelessly threw them into the cookie pile. Thus, most were cracked...

I made a stamp of some trees, mixed it with a purchased tree stamp and poked a lot of holes in the porcelain. Wasn't sure how to spell the word Picotee- doesn't it need an accent over one of the e's? This one is my ode to xc skiing, when its snowing but very quiet- i.e. all you can hear are your skis in the snow.

This is a close-up of the lid/stopper for the "House Wine" vessel. I like sneaking in some detail work on areas that don't show when the top is in place.

This is the second "House Wine" vessel that I made. This time, underglaze transfers were added in an effort to build more depth to the surface. These are fun to make but seem to require a good bit of time on the workbench.
 
This one is headed for a November show.

Handbuilt stoneware mugs, approximately 12oz capacity, fired cone10. Surface treatment includes 3-d dwelling, carved-out hillside community, and underglaze image transfers. The transfers are new to me...using a CriCut Explore to create silkscreen masks through which thickened underglaze is printed onto rice paper. Once dried, the surface of the mug is coated in underglaze, the transfer is sprayed until saturated, and then pressed/burnished (with pint side to the mug) onto the bisque fired surface. I'm not yet comfortable enough with this technique to try it on greenware but it should work equally well.
 
Certainly there is a story to these mugs...the short version centers around work in some of the poorest slums in Central/South America in contrast with visits to numerous iconic cites in Europe.

ellen currans showed me how to add detail with a handle having the same texture as the center of the platter. it worked very well here, thank you ellen!! you can see the results of uneven spraying in the sort of wavy dark and light spots on the outer rim. too wet.

Way over fired and carbon coring, the spirals warped and sagged, first time this bad with pulled spirals.

Carved with pencil. This mug was the first, so I have added more to the other mugs. I am using a lotus for the design with each petal having some motifs of Peace, Love (heart), Namaste, Vegan and scrolling vines with butterflies. Added my name, logo and Buster stamp on a petal in instead of the bottom, where I carved the spirit symbol.
 
Any suggestions are welcome, please. I was thinking of trying different glazing techniques. I'm open to any ideas. It is a Bee Mix 5 white body, no sand. I fire to ^6.

These are really fun pieces called Yard Birds. Each one is hand painted with fun whimsical floral designs.