EarthseaPottery

This is the second post in a series focused on Michael’s striking new work. Read the first post here.

For the glossy blue and red glazes Michael starts with a clear glaze formula and adds colorants (metallic oxides). For dark blue, cobalt oxide; for light blue, a combination of rutile (rutile is titanium with iron impurities), cobalt carbonate, and red iron oxide. For red, copper carbonate, tin oxide, and a small amount of red iron oxide.

The matt blue is a low temperature copper blue glaze Michael modified for high fire. The yellow glaze uses yellow iron oxide as the colorant. Each glaze is in a different base. All glazes require extensive and continuous testing, and most glazes from books or articles haven’t worked as expected and need adjustment.

Michael designed and fabricated the kiln around his firing technique, which is tailored to our clay and glazes.