So, here we see that yes indeed, the house was originally a little log cabin. Somebody dug a hole, laid a million rocks for a foundation, then cut logs by hand and made a house. Neato! Except for the new electric wires, our basement looks much as did in 1865, except dirtier.
OK, me and my piles. I have bags of glaze ingredients all over the basement, and boxes of clay too. For example, the red-brown bag has Spanish red iron oxide. Lastly you see the measuring scale. Glaze ingredients are powders of silica, kaolin, frits, limestone, talc etc, with oxides like cobalt or iron or nickel or copper or commercial colorants added to make colors.
This is probably my most boring series of posts ever, but it makes a change, right?
12 comments:
Gary, you do realize that you can only stall th einevitable fo so long? EVentually, you'll have ot stop taking pictures and actually mix the glazes ... :-D
MY GOD GORDO, YOU ARE GOOD! And of course, once you have the pics, you have to blog them and all, have a cup of coffee, take the dogs out....
actually, the mixing is easy. The SETUP and CLEANUP is the work.
ahh yes... the inevitable awaits!
here goes....
so you use kaolinite.. can you also use bentonite or Illite too?
Bentonite is volcanic and you always add 2-3 percent fine milled bentonite to help hold everything else in suspension. So it does NOT all settle in the bottom. If your glaze mix settles on the bottom and the water on top, you have a thick block that is hard to use as a glaze, and wouldmake an uneven glaze application.
I understand bentonite is like pumice: a fine and floaty mineral, so it holds other particles up in the mix. Plus, it does not change the glaze quality in any way.
That is the cleanest looking "nasty" basement I have ever seen---trust me. :)
The funny thing is that ours is the oldest on the street, but also the only basement that never floods. SOLID and clever and hand built, that is our old house.
You're right, the floor is not dirt, there is concrete. The job is messy, flying powders everywhere.
I guess the bentonite is acting as a more fine suspension medium for all the other ingredients.. interesting that glazes are clay "based" but it also makes sense.. instead of layering straight oxides-pigments etc onto your item.. you put a fine layer of clay + pigments onto clay item and they form a better bond. I suppose the kaolinite fires better too.
Right again, grego. The bentonite holds things in suspension, and although glaze is glass, it has clay in it too so it adheres nicely to the clay body.
Far from boring, Gary. I love to see where the alchemy begins. And your basement work area is a model of tidiness compared with that of some potters of my acquaintance.
Thanks John. The studio area is nice but untidy. I should clarify: everthing is disorganized and untidy, and some things dirty. I will begin a cleaning kick when I finish mixing these batches. I am not inclined to be tidy, but I like things to be tidy. I could use a butler.
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