Red Earthenware Sculpture with a White Disappearing Act

 During studio cleaning, I came across a number of packages of unused clay, and have been slowly reconstituting it for use in small sculptures and ceramic vessels.  I finally used up all the red earthenware by making more three dimensional figures.  For decoration, I used a design that graced my tiles several years ago.  These were painted with black brush work, then adding white in the background.  The design was then enhanced by scratching thin outlines through the white to expose the red clay body.  

I  painted my figures black and white, then made the outlines in red using the same sgraffitto technique.  These were placed in the kiln and fired  up.  Two days later, however,  when I opened the kiln, I found to my surprise and disappointment that the white background in all my pieces had burned entirely away!  So now my pieces were just black and red!  Annoyed by the fact that all that painting had been for naught, I kept them anyway because they still had nice forms and they were fun to play with.  The first pieces were ceramic chairs that I had used a heart shaped stamp for.

Human and animal figures sported lively designs similar to what I had seen a few years back in Scythian tattoos. They can hold their own in red and black. But they would have been so much bolder in black and white and red!

My red earthenware is now used up, and I don’t anticipate obtaining more of it.  I’m not certain that I can say that it was made into something more useful than a package of hardened lumps in my studio, but at least these small pieces are more interesting. 

Making the Most of Reconstituted Clay

 The summer months and early autumn were spent trying to clear out some excess materials from my studio.  Most sensible people would try to give away their surplus stuff, ala Marie Kondo.  I sought instead to put the supplies to work. With a barrel of locally mined clay used up in making small sculptures and vessels for my pit fires, I turned towards my bags of hopelessly hardened up red earthenware clay.  I had written some years ago about the process of reconstituting hardened clay but this bears repeating.

The clay had to be broken up with hammer and chisel, then soaked under water to soften.  The slurry was spread out onto plaster bats to dry, then wedged into usable, pliable clay.  After being put under wraps for a few weeks, I took the clay out to make tiles, vessels, and small sculptures. 

The vessels that I made also required a bit of reconstitution work, as a number of glazes had hardened up as well.  The glazes were restored by grinding them with water onto a marble slab.

The stamps that I had previously used on my giant “Liberty Snakes” were put to work again on the clay.  The free-form leaf-like stamps were used in the ceramic udu drum below.  The colors here were made from burnished terra sigillata. 

Some of my specialty glazes were not food safe, so this little covered jar, however charming, should not be used as a sugar bowl.  

Finally, because I was uncertain about how my hand painted ceramics would work out, I remade the bed and pillow ocarinas over again, this time with stamps and commercial glazes.