Guy Ballard

Last night, I lost 2 pieces and gained 1 a net loss of 1.  One was a lidded jar that I finished last week and when I tried to fine-tune the lid the the rim broke off. It did not seem like it was worth trying to salvage at that point. The second was a vase that I was planning to add decoration to and when I got ready to work on it I dropped it from the perch that it rested. I started a big bowl and it turned out to look more like a basket.  Some one suggested that it would make for a big bowl of beans. I thought that interesting because I just added some make shift handles to the bowl and I guess you could use it for baked beans. Deciding how to glaze this monster will be challenging.  I am thinking, a simple dip. Finally, we were given a demo of how to add colored slip decorations using paper from a laser printer and adding slip.  The print on the paper has wax in it and repels the slip added to the paper. I am going to try this with paper from the color printer....

Anxiously awaiting some of the work to come form the kiln. I think it is always a little exciting and sometimes a little sad when you see your work emerge from the back room or the kiln. I had high hopes for the boxes that I have been working, but they didn't turn out to have as much character as the first one done.   The one the left is the first one completed with the marshmallow glaze the two on the right were dipped in a white glaze.   Here is cylinder created in red clay and dipped 370 over 240.  The color changes in the different light. Here it appears in reddish brown, but in natural light it appears more brown.   Last night, I worked on a vessel with a lid and then finished up some pieces to be bisque fired.  Now it is time to research whether or not you can add underglazes to a bisque fired piece of pottery.    

Last night, was the first night of the Spring class.  I spent most of the night finishing up wok on some pieces from the last class and then through a couple of cylinders, mostly practice.  I need a lot of practice. I threw a couple things last night that I don't know that I will even keep. But I do need the practice. This term I am going to try something a little different.  I am going to plan something ahead of the class and see if how close I can come to executing it. Also, rather than working on functional pieces I think I will begin to work on some art pieces. Here is an example

It was a busy night of finishing up work for this term of the pottery class. The order of the day was glazing. This time my goal was to keep better record of how and what I glazed my work with so that if I chose to repeat it in the future, I could.  Dave was there last night and gave me some really good advice of how to handle the boxes. Rather than putting wax resist in the grooves and wiping away the the glaze, he suggested that I apply the glaze to the inside and outside of the box and then scrape the glaze from the grooves. This techniques saved a lot of time. As you can see here I chose to dip the boxes in White  Glaze and scrape the glaze from the grooves in the  red clay. Next, I made a large vase in red clay and dipped it in 370 over 240  as you can see here.  I had made three small nut bowls in white clay and I decided to do the larger of the two in Clear over Dynasty as shown here,  While the other two were dipped in Dynasty, T...