BLOG Archive January 2010

NCECA Fever

It's starting again - NCECA anticipation!

Along with all the other great events at this ceramics conference, we will be hosting our Potters Council's first ever juried show of Members work. It is a fabulous collection and I am looking forward to seeing it in person.

The gang on facebook "Who is going to NCECA 2010 in Philly?

http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=437972490397

is getting anxious too. The Clayart Room will be buzzing.

If you see me in Philly, say Hello!


Back to work!  See you in Philly   Chris

TRYING NEW STAIN COLORS

The Mason website has listings of all the colors available with a guide showing which ones are suitable for using in clay bodies and which ingredients to avoid in your clear glazes. 

Why does this matter? Every clay body has ingredients in it that can react to a colorant. Sometimes that lovely pink fires green or the blue fires pink because of it. If your clear glaze has the wrong ingredient in it, it will change the colors or bleed them. 

You can be reasonably safe if you stick with their guidelines, but safe is not always fun. I have tried dozens of other stains with great results. The trick is to test every single batch you blend in order to see what happens to the color with and without a glaze. Then you can decide whether to keep using it or not.

I had a pink stain that fired the most lovely pale green. I liked it and kept using it, but since I have the attention span of a gnat, I quickly forgot the pink was really green and ruined a pattern with the wrong color.

This is why I use  the ones that look like the end product.

I would encourage you to buy an ounce or so of different colors and give them a try. Some are incredibly beautiful and are colors you cannot achieve by simply mixing two primaries. 


DOING AS I SAY ....

So, today I am writing down my goals and plans for 2010.

As always it is a bit daunting to lay out all the things I want to accomplish this year. I am pleased to note though that I did all I wanted to do last year. One of my big goals for this year was to re-vamp my old website. I was setting aside a few weeks to do that. Well, thanks to this new software it only took two days ... so already I can check off one item. Bonus!

This means I can get into the studio to do what I really want  ...  get my new line going for this year. I have a lot of ideas percolating and a new direction in mind.  

I hope you have your plan written down and posted somewhere you can see it each day. It really does help keep your eye on the ball.


Mixing colors

Do you always have to mix colors thoroughly?

No. You can mix them in many ways and get great results.

Mixing them in wet or dry you can stop at any point to achieve swirls of color or  small specks of color through the clay. You can thoroughly mix the colors then gently  knead it into white, stopping when you like the pattern. 

mixswirl

Set a bit aside to dry then crush it and knead it back into the white clay for yet another look. You can add multiple colors dry or wet. I have scraped swirls off dry clay and pressed them carefully to keep the shape. There are no rules, so try anything.


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