Textiles and Clay cont.

After bisquet firing, the ceramic piece looked like this. The blue parts have been painted with cobalt oxide stain and the green parts with copper oxide:

The ceramic piece after bisquet firing

After bisquet firing (detail)

The ceramic piece held it's shape well during bisquet firing and the metallic oxides have changed colour. The piece is still powdery and will be very fragile until it is fired to stoneware tempereature (1280'c). I dripped translucent glaze onto parts of the surface so I could compare the qualities of the matt and glossy surfaces. The piece was then fired to stoneware temperature and the finished piece looks like this:

Glazed and finished piece

Glazed and finished piece (detail)

On the whole I was very pleased with how this piece came out. The form changed slightly in the kiln and became more of an oval shape. I like this as the form is more interesting now and the piece has taken on it's own shape. The metallic oxides also came out well and provide a nice contrast with the whiteness of the porcelain. I particularly like how the lace ended up and it worked better than I expected. The fragility of the lace is clearly visible in places, accentuated by the copper oxide. There are also interesting contrasts between the glazed and unglazed parts of the plain porcelain. In a way, the glassy surface that the glaze has covered dilutes and mutes the texture of the fabric. I think that the unglazed parts are much more interesting and have more depth. This way of working definately allows me to create lots of surface texture, and I really like this.