Smoke Fired Form

                  Purpose: Experience an ancient method of creating surface decoration for bisqued clay.

Reflection: Both alter the surface of the clay and are traditional techniques dating back centuries. You glaze clay by putting a fired clay piece in a fire and glaze by painting on glaze to a fired piece and then firing it again. Glaze puts a even thick layer of glass on the surface of the clay and is usually colorful and shiny. Smoke firing applies a smokey color that varies throughout the surface. It is one of the oldest forms of clay decoration and it dates back millennia. One thing we did to alter the smoke firing is we glued on flowers to create flower patterns in the smokey color. I think I could have spaced the flowers out more to get a better result. After firing our smoke forms, we applied wax to prevent the smoke residue from coming off on our hands.