This post I thought I would touch base briefly on some of the processes I utilize to produce my work in a few different ways.
At at the moment I work with a high fire porcelain clay body that can be fired in both reduction and oxidation depending on the piece. Decorations on the pieces are generally done after trimming, before bisque firing, or after bisque firing.
The first images contain a pink foam object or form that had been milled out on a CNC router. A mold is taken of this form and it will be slip cast, modeled, decorated with underglaze and fired before a final glaze firing. The images below show just one example of how a mold could possibly be taken off this object.
The images following represent the basic process of how my thrown work is produced.
I usually start with a drawn profile of on or several pieces to keep in mind as I throw; after wedging several balls of clay I start by centering and pulling the clay into a cylinder. After the appropriate height is obtained I form the curves of the piece through a series's of hand working and ceramic tooling. I approach this step very intuitively because the motion of the clay is very important to me in applying a sort of fluidity. Next I refine the form through trimming following by attachments and underglaze decoration that I keep loose like an impression. This simultaneously allows me to be very gestural as well as allow for the opportunity to layer further detail through china paint and glaze application. There are several examples of how I decorate my pieces with underglaze below towards the end of the slider.
