Mishima or the Art of Inlaid Colored Slip Decoration
One of the cool things with keeping a blog is that it serves as a journal for me for trying new techniques and also a way for me to share the results with whomever is interested. I have been meaning to try the technique of inlaying colored slip into a piece, otherwise known as Mishima for awhile now. I just happened to have a leather hard pot available and decided to try it out yesterday afternoon.
Mishima originated in Korea during the Koryo Period (935-1392) where floral and animal motifs were incised and filled in with a contrasting colored slip on tea bowls. Contemporary ceramic artists borrow techniques from the past and make them more current – though often straying from and breaking some rules along the way. Now, isn’t that fun? I certainly like breaking the rules. For example the celadons and blues that I favor are normally fired to cone 10 in reduction (gas firing), however, I use a cone 6 glaze that resembles a traditional celadon in oxidation (electric kiln) that Mary Cay shared with me. Is it cheating? Nah, I don’t think so – I’m just making it work for me.
If you’re interested, a very basic Mishima tutorial follows below:
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Meanwhile, I received a very exciting email and phone call last week. I hope to be able to share the good news with you soon!
In other news, Mary Cay and I visited Denver artist, Mark Brasuell on Friday afternoon. Mark trained as a metalsmith, but has since turned to drawing and painting where he excels! After visiting a bit, touring his studio and getting a sneak peak at some new work in progress for an upcoming show, we purchased a huge lot of jewelry findings, beads, stringing supplies and tools from Mark now that he is no longer interested in jewelry making. We haven’t gone through the lot yet – it’s a bit mind bending with how much inventory we have. This coming week, we’ll be culling the supplies that we want to keep for our own work, and then expect a sister Etsy shop to open in the near future, where we will be liquidating the remaining stock.
Have a creative week,
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Featuring Mary Cay
I often write about my friend and ceramic’s mentor, Mary Cay, who is an instructor at the Art Student’s League of Denver and quite a committed ceramic artist. She has given me so much inspiration since I met her 3 years ago and I’ve furthered my education in the technical aspects of making work and glaze science…thank you!!
Yesterday, I went over to the Fire House Gallery on Santa Fe in Denver to help her photograph her current show. It was so wonderful to see the show again, without the crowds of opening night. I really got a chance to capture the details and to see how the work was hung. Last year, Ceramic’s Monthly featured Mary Cay and her development of glaze kiln jewels in an article by Sumi von Dassow called A Glittering Obsession that’s worth reading.
On a side note, she has been making wishbone pendants from bone infused porcelain china that I’ve been trying to get her to sell on Etsy. I have one and they’re so much fun, not to mention unusual!
That’s it from me for today, I don’t have anything new ceramic wise. My in-laws are in town and I’ve been busy doing non art related activities.
Have a good weekend everyone,
Cone 6 Triaxial Glaze Test
While it may look like I’m getting ready to bowl with my ceramic materials, I haven’t quite lost my mind yet! With the help from my friend and ceramic’s mentor, Mary Cay, I performed a more complicated glaze test this past week. It’s called a “Triaxial Blend” and I used Robin Hopper’s text, The Ceramic Spectrum (page 96) as a guide.
The idea behind the testing is that you get 21 different variations on 3 base glazes which opens up quite a new world of color development to the ceramic artist. It was a pretty cool experiment. For base glaze “A” I used a Val Cushing cone 6 glaze, VC Satin White Liner, pg. 130. For base glaze “B” I used another Val Cushing cone 6 glaze, D base pg. 123 and added copper carb at 3% and cobalt carb at 1%. For base glaze “C” I used Denton 6, pg. 282 from the Electric Kiln Ceramics Book and added copper carb at 2.5%. There’s a few keepers, but I’ll need to look at them a little more closely in the next week.
Meanwhile back in the real world, my Epson printer died! BooHoo. It’s been acting funny for the past month and last night when I went to print an invoice for someone, just blank pages. I tried cleaning the print heads and all the other maintenance tasks and all I get is yellow ink. Not very practical. BTW, I also replaced all the ink cartridges so it’s not low ink levels. This printer has lasted 2 1/2 years and I’m convinced that unfortunately they’re made to be disposable! Off to Costco this afternoon to replace it with another. Sigh…
Have a good week everyone!
