Are We There yet?

It has been a while since I have posted an actual post with anything worth saying. I've been busy, tired and burned out. That big fall show did me in. But now that spring has arrived on the prairies, I am feeling more and more energized to make new and interesting pots. The creative itch needs scratching, so it was a well timed e-mail from the Medalta events coordinator telling me about a couple of workshops that are coming up this summer. Robin Dupont is leading an atmospheric firing workshop with the focus on salt, soda and wood from July 14th to the 24th and I signed up for it that day. I have not been to Medalta to fire a kiln since July of 2013, so this is a perfect opportunity to spend more time down there that isn't spent frantically prepping and loading pots (my feet will thank me). In the past when I have been down there, I would arrive around noon on Thursday, glaze and load all that afternoon/evening and start the firing first thing Friday morning. That would usually only leave 1 day to "relax" on Saturday and then on Sunday the kilns would be unloaded and the kiln area cleaned up and I'd be out of there and back on the road to Calgary by noon. Ten whole days there with 24 hour studio access will be a treat. The only trick with taking a workshop of this length is accommodations. Medalta is currently working on building a place for visiting artists to stay, but for now, they have a network of people in Medicine Hat that rent rooms, or there are the local motels and hotels. I found a place to stay through a friend who has a relative in Medicine Hat and is willing to rent her basement for 10 days. It's close and cheap so not too much of an added burden. Once Medalta finishes the residences, it will be much easier and hopefully more affordable, to plan an extended stay down there. So for now I will be making a few pots to put into the first firing down there. I have some Babu porcelain coming and from past experience, this body should work beautifully in the salt and soda kilns and is somewhat translucent if thin enough. It has been so long since I have taken an actual holiday longer than 4 days, I might not know what to do with myself If you want to sign up, here's the link: http://medalta.org/atmospheric-firing-medalta

How to lose 5lbs in 1 day

I went to Medicine Hat last Wednesday to fire the Salt and Soda Kilns at the Shaw Centre at Medalta.

I left right after work on Wednesday afternoon and arrived at our motel at 7:30. Kathy and I got up early and went to glaze and load the kilns on Thursday and turned the kilns on low and slow overnight to preheat. There were various issues with this round of firing. The cone packs in the soda kiln blew up during the preheat, so we were flying a bit blind. Aaron found us an optical thermographer called the Cyclops. He was not sure how to use it, so had one of the train kiln operators from the old IXL brick factory to come over and trouble shoot it with us. As this was our only guide for temperature, we used it as well as colour in the kiln. By the time a witness cone bent in the salt kiln we had finished adding the soda, so that was pretty much a shot in the dark. We took a reading when cone 7 bent, and it looked like the “cyclops” was out by a hundred degrees or so. I think we were slightly underfired in the soda, but got some decent results. The salt was much better, although it could have used a bit more salt. In total, we added about 6 pounds of soda ash, and 14 pounds of salt. I did not take many pictures during the firing as it is too hard to do that when there are only 2 of us. If I could find a way to grow a 3^rd arm, that would help. I would look weird though.

As to the weight loss, it was all sweat. The temp in Medicine Hat on the day of the firing was about 31 degrees Celsius (87.8 F). Without the kilns it was pretty darned hot out. The kilns themselves were at about 2385 F or so at top temp. We were a little limp with the heat by the end of the day. While we were waiting for the salt kiln to reach salting temp (it took until 9 pm or so), we ordered a pizza, around the time the pizza was to arrive, a torrential downpour sprang up. So we had heat, lightning, thunder, rain and pizza.

All in all I think the firings were OK. The soda was a bit dry in spots, but the salt was relatively juicy. There were some really nice glazes in this firing. I had some excellent carbon trapping in a Malcolm Davis shino, some good colour development in the yellow salt glaze, and some really lovely pink halos and blushing on the insides of some of my rice bowls where I used the Andrew Wong Lustre glaze. That glaze can come out quite boring and white if not reduced enough (?), but this time, I think we had good reduction. Not too much, just enough. 

Oh ya, I also saw the Medalta International Cup Show. The labels had not been put up yet, but I was able to recognize quite a few potters. There were several of Jim Gottuso's yunomis and beer glasses, a couple of cups from Zygote, a wall piece from Mindy Andrews and a ton of others that I just can't recall the makers of off the top of my head. There was stoneware, porcelain, low fire, high fire, salt, soda, functional and not so functional, etc etc...Very good show. Great job Carol for picking all of these amazing cups.