Studio Update: Week of 2/ 13/23

In the studio this week Brian has been teaching us how to build an arch form on a kiln as we start to rebuild the top on Lil Eddy ( one of our kilns). Aside from that I made some test tiles to try out a promising cone 6 glaze that Jeff, my undergrad professor, has been testing in their cone 6 studio. Those went into a bisque on Wednesday so I got them glazed over the weekend and will fire them in the test kiln on Monday. I made my test tiles a lot larger than previous tests just so I will be able to tell a little bit better if there will be any inconsistencies. We loaded up the cone 6 residual soda on Sunday so I glazed everything I had for that firing this week. This is my first time actually firing a gas kiln so Gh has been super kind to walk me through it. I also threw some cups that I put some flashing slips on for the upcoming woodfire. I am also interested in switching over to terasigilatas instead of my engobes because I like the finished quality so much more than my dull finished engobes. I bought a book and read through it this week and bought the sodium silicate that I need to deffloculate the slip. I will mix up a batch next week and do a lot of triaxial color testing to see what my range of color looks like ( and I will update my triaxial wall in my studio. hooray!).

Image 1: learning to build an arch

Image 2: loading the soda

Image 3: Autumn making our kiln god for a safe firing

Image 4: bricked up the door to the soda

Image 5 : a couple things I glazed for the soda firing