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Sunday 22 December 2013

Winter Greetings from the North




Wishing you all the best for Christmas and the New Year!




And then it will be full steam ahead. After a dozen plus glaze tests we may have, indeed most likely have, at last found a recipe which appears to be both stable and look as good as my beloved old matt transparent. Good for Rodger, even though he was getting a little slagged off at times for being a 'David Green'. David being our old art school glaze tutor who used contemplate and calculate countless glaze formulas as he puffed his pipe. Most frequently they were dreadfully disappointing but always in his view 'interesting'.

 It has just taken a very long time to put the tests through the kiln and then use them with a sufficient variety of slips and kiln firings to feel confident about them.  I am now optimistic and excited about getting back to pots which have been stuck in the pipeline and ideas which I have had to put on hold. At least I did a lot more throwing than usual over the last few months,  so I am better stocked with the smaller domestic items for the turn of the year. May it be a good one for you all.

4 comments:

  1. Good to hear the news!
    Blessings Be!!
    xx gz & the Pirate

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  2. Love that bear!
    Merry Christmas to all!

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  3. Agggggh, glaze testing....... Drives me crazy, but it has to be done! Mind you I am starting to dream of trying a year without glazing at all... it would be interesting to see what could be acheived with clay, texture, and oxides...

    David Green..., A Handbook of Pottery Glazes is one of my favorite books! How interesting that you had him as a glaze tutor at art school. It is funny how abstract writers of books can be, until you read of them having a life outside the book, and puffing a pipe! Wonderful!

    Happy Christmas and New Year!

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    Replies
    1. How good to hear that David's book is one of your favourites Peter! He certainly knew his subject and we must have been most unappreciative at the time. We pupils were impatient, wanting success first time and we didn't comprehend the complexity of it all (which I do now by jiggers). The poor man had a lot to put up with!

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