Monthly Tech-Tip | No tracking! No ads! |
Each potter using Tenmoku has their own preferences about how the glaze should look. Ron clearly likes the iron crystals to develop well on the edges of contours. He has learned how to walk a delicate firing and recipe balance to achieve this effect. If the percentage of iron is too high, or the glaze is applied too thin, reduction is too heavy or the cooling too slow there will be too muchy crystallization. If the iron is too low, cooling is too fast or the glaze it too thick it will be a solid black. Additionally, this effect depends on a glaze having a fluid melt (the iron is a strong flux), if the glaze is too thick it will run downward during the firing.
Glossary |
Tenmoku
Tenmoku is a kind of high temperature reduction firing ceramic glaze. Glossy, very dark brown or maroon, fluxed by iron oxide to have high melt fluidity. |
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Glossary |
Crystallization
Ceramic glazes form crystals on cooling if the chemistry is right and the rate of cool is slow enough to permit molecular movement to the preferred orientation. |
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