Author Archives: Elizabeth

About Elizabeth

My work is based on simple and practical shapes-- a bowl for fruit, a plate for food, a vase for flowers-- though I strive at the same time for a certain lightness and elegance of form. Once the piece has taken form, then I try to push it beyond the limits of the ordinary, pulling the clay to distort it and deliberately or spontaneously layering or splashing on contrasting colour to fuse with the shape and catch the eye. When a piece comes out of the kiln, it pleases me if it makes you think of a nicely laid table and at the same time of surfaces marked by the wind, water and sun, like a rock or the face of a cliff or the trunk of a tree.

Flotsam

From yesterday’s kiln; a small bowl, as a test for a couple of big bowls that are just out of the bisque kiln. These new ones I’ve made much wider and shallower, hoping that applying the trails of glaze will then be less treacherous. With the sharper curve as seen here, if the glaze is just a little too wet, it tends to break away from the sweep of the line, creating a new, discordant line downwards… Washing everything off, and starting over, is time consuming and more than a little frustrating. I’ve added a sprinkling of white to the outside, as a link between the inner and outer surface.

Di: 15 cm, ht: 6 cm. Cone 6, porcelaneous stoneware.

Goblets – Caramel

I am still working my way to attractive, reliable glazes that work well in combination, here in my new environment at Gladstone Clayworks. I am not there yet, but I feel I am making progress. In contrast to the distorted bowl I made earlier this month, this time I dipped the pieces first in a transparent/white glaze before applying the dark, iron-rich glaze. This combination turns dusty brown (of the bowl) to a much lighter, caramel-like colour. On the one side, over that, a wide squirt of a white gives the caramel an even lighter, more golden tone; on the other side, the squirt of Bailey’s Orange Red gives some red, but far less than in the distorted bowl. The last, very thin squirts of my old faithful Blanc Beurré (from former Brussels days), kept it’s line nicely where it fell over two layers of glaze. However, not surprisingly, it ran badly where it fell over the broad squirts of the white and the Bailey’s; here the line broke, and left erratic blotches of white.

I misjudged how much all these glazes would run; but I got lucky. Though the glazes settled too heavily at the foot, I only lost one, out of a series of six. Live and learn…

Ht: 9 cm; di: 7.5 cm. Fired in oxidation, Cone 6; porcelaneous stoneware.

Distorted bowl

Thrown using a white stoneware, trimmed while still quite wet; I find the body has to be quite damp for me to be able to distort it by forcing the sides inwards and upwards. My combination of Brussels and Ottawa glazes are finally doing what I want. Here I first dipped the piece into the base glaze; then, using a cup, poured a good splodge of a white down the middle (which then turns into a yellowy gold); finally, I used a slip trailer to squirt thick trails of Bailey’s Orange-Red towards the edges of the bowl. Over the first iron-heavy glaze, the orange red really does flash red, over the second white glaze, it gives a darker, more silvery hue.

Di: 25 and 26 cm, ht: 7 cm. Fired to Cone 6, in oxidation.

Ikebana moribana – breaking blue

I’m based in Ottawa now, and have become a member of Gladstone Clayworks. It’s taken me a while to adjust to new materials, glazes, and firing to Cone 6, which is lower than I was used to in Brussels. It’s been three months now, and I think I am ready to post to my blog again.

This blue glaze gives a wide range of colour, depending on the thickness with which it is applied. First I coated the entire pot with a thin coating of an iron-rich glaze. Next I poured the blue glaze in, and out; and left it to dry till the next day. For the final glaze application, I set the dish upside down on struts over a wide basin, and poured, letting the drips settled on the rim. These I did not fettle, but left, dangling from the rim. During the glaze firing, the heavy drops ooze downwards from the rim, creating a haphazard, speckled dark-blue surface.

Below – detail.

Over the flat surface inside the bowl (the kenzan used in ikebana requires a flat surface), the blue glaze breaks irregularly over the underlying brown glaze.

Tall porcelain vases – Wanderers (ht: 30 cm, dia: 8 cm)

These vases are among the last pieces I made in 2016 while still in Brussels. The decoration is very different from what I have been doing in the past: I smeared moist cobalt oxide onto the porcelain, making final adjustments as needed, by adding a little here and there, and sanding marks off where they weren’t wanted. Each vase has either two, or three designs. These tall vases were made by fusing two thrown cylinders together. A clear, transparent glaze poured on the inside; the same glaze lightly sprayed on the outside, using the spray gun.

Audrey Blackman porcelain; fired to cone 6. in oxidation.

Goblets – Storm: stoneware

Next time I really must remember to photograph my pieces, even if I don’t like them. Because sometimes, when I reglaze a piece (hoping that an extra touch will make all the difference), it would be good to confirm the difference. Believe me, these are much improved. This time, I have no photograph to show what these three looked like before: though nice oil spots showed where the tenmoku was reasonably thick, elsewhere it was thin and weak, showing the stoneware surface beneath; the contrasting white both on the inside and outside was also too faint. Had I been using porcelain clay, my thin coating of the buttery-white glaze on the inside would have been fine; however, it being stoneware, the clay showed through. Like tea stains without the tea: not something anyone would be tempted to drink from.

I like them now. I gave the inside a second coat of the buttery white. Then I actually took a brush (I always squirt my glazes), slapped a thick brush stroke of the dusty-white glaze over the unsightly areas, and finished up with a few squirts of my hard, buttery white.

A good save…

Reverse, below: the drips from the squirted glaze almost meet at the bottom;

and the brush stroke of white sweeps up from the right.

Ht: 8 cm; widest di: 7.5 cm.

Lidded pot – Porcelain

It is always with some trepidation that I listen to friends suggesting I make something specifically for them. It all sounds innocent enough, they’d perhaps simply like to have a few more goblets to add to some earlier ones of mine they already have, and while I’m at it, why not a sugar bowl with a matching glaze decorative touch, and, pushing their luck a little, also a milk pitcher?

I wasn’t pleased with my first attempts, but my friend seems happy with this piece (I call it a lidded pot, she calls it a sugar bowl), but she will have to wait some time still for anything like a milk pitcher (I have a few waiting for bisque firing, and, if successful, they will be the subject of an upcoming post).

Below you see the other side of the piece:

Here’s another one I made, something like a lidded moon jar.

In both cases, decoration with three squirts of glaze, where a white turns blue over the dark tenmoku.

Transparent glaze inside (poured), and a light coating all over the outside (spray-gun).

Second side:

Goblets – caramel chocolate

I seem to have moved on to lidded pots, but still the goblets continue. Here again, tenmoku, overlaid with the zinc white 66. I’ve been making sets of six, each goblet in the set of similar shape and size, with splashed glazes linking them together. I quite like the stark glaze drips at the back; however, some (who shall remain nameless) tell me the back should be less obviously a back, and also be a front (I think). I’ve been working on the idea, and the next lidded pots (awaiting a glaze kiln fiting) have an additional upside-down splash here. I was not entirely successful in making the splash ‘fit’… I will keep you posted.

Ht: 7.5 cm; di: 6.6 cm.

Anagama kiln – Small vase

Anagama kiln, five-day wood firing.

Heavily grogged, white stoneware clay. Celadon inside, and a splash on the outside.

All the other tones are the natural effect of the swirling ash in the kiln.

Ht: 10 cm.; di: 8.5 cm.

Below, reverse and side view.

Anagama – Wood-fired vase

Five-day firing, at Arlette’s, out towards Arlon. Logs loaded regularly, day and night, anxiously watching the temperature gauge, as it moves towards 1300°C. Thanks to Alain, who was on the kiln team. The kiln is large, many potters contribute their pieces – the spread in the field is about half the kiln load (see above).

I used a heavily-grogged, white stoneware clay; I first pulled up a cylinder, and combed it while wet; then opened it out further, to get its rounded form. Angling the pot, I squirted one splash a celadon on the neck, letting it run down to the bottom, back (see below). Celadon poured on the inside. All the other colours are the magic of the ash glazes swirling in the atmosphere of the kiln, and then falling randomly on my piece.

Ht: 14 cm.; di: 12 cm.

Back view (at bottom).

Elizabeth Davies

Stoneware and porcelain ceramics