I have tons of hobbies, and one is ceramics! I do both sculpture and pottery. I figure this is the most relevant to a chicken board. XD
These are pretty old. I need photos of my newer pieces!
This is made with ChuChu's (African grey parrot) feathers and Xandy's (Arab gelding) tail hair.
I really don't like the shape, but I like the placement of the feather on this side, framed by the hair, the design of the surface decoration came out very well. I've got a few other (much nicer) pots bisqued (ready for feather and horsehair firing) but the outdoor kiln used for this process is weather dependent ... and this is Oregon. I'm hoping I'll get a lot done this summer.
Horsehair pottery is made by heating the pottery up in the kiln to over 1300°F (since I do this with raku loads, I fire to a higher temp than usual for horsehair, around 1800°F, and just wait for the piece to cool to 1300). The piece is taken out of the kiln while at this temperature, and then hair is laid over the surface, which burns a carbon imprint into the clay. If the wind is blowing you get a shadow effect like in this pot. There's a window of maybe 30 seconds to do this; too hot and the hair doesn't leave nice lines, and too cool (under 900 degrees) and it doesn't burn.
Yes, it smells very bad while doing it.
Any hair or fur will leave an imprint, but will give you very different results. I would like to try Morgan's fur some time, I bet it would be cloudy and smokey looking, rather than having lines. Can't wait to see how silkie feathers look! A local emu farmer gave me some emu feathers -- those leave a very distinctive mark, of course.
The textural lines are actually from burnishing, which is where you align the platelets of clay in one direction to give it a soft sheen. I'm better at it now so it doesn't look so ridged. Ugh. This piece is very personal to me but the more I look at it the more I dislike it, except the awesome feather placement. *lol*
Two of ChuChu's feathers on the back with some Xandy hair squiggles.
This is the kind of detail the feather imprint gives. Isn't that incredible? This is what I have for my avatar here.
A crappy photo of the bottle I did last summer. I sold this one to my uncle so I can't take better pictures. I used an underglaze to give it some color. I like the shape on this one far better than the other.
I auctioned off a personalized horsehair pot last fall to benefit BEAT Riding Center (the non-profit therapeutic stable I work at). The person who won the auction gave me hair from their horse who had died suddenly of cancer last year to make the pot with. It was really special to make that.
These are pretty old. I need photos of my newer pieces!
This is made with ChuChu's (African grey parrot) feathers and Xandy's (Arab gelding) tail hair.
I really don't like the shape, but I like the placement of the feather on this side, framed by the hair, the design of the surface decoration came out very well. I've got a few other (much nicer) pots bisqued (ready for feather and horsehair firing) but the outdoor kiln used for this process is weather dependent ... and this is Oregon. I'm hoping I'll get a lot done this summer.
Horsehair pottery is made by heating the pottery up in the kiln to over 1300°F (since I do this with raku loads, I fire to a higher temp than usual for horsehair, around 1800°F, and just wait for the piece to cool to 1300). The piece is taken out of the kiln while at this temperature, and then hair is laid over the surface, which burns a carbon imprint into the clay. If the wind is blowing you get a shadow effect like in this pot. There's a window of maybe 30 seconds to do this; too hot and the hair doesn't leave nice lines, and too cool (under 900 degrees) and it doesn't burn.
Yes, it smells very bad while doing it.
Any hair or fur will leave an imprint, but will give you very different results. I would like to try Morgan's fur some time, I bet it would be cloudy and smokey looking, rather than having lines. Can't wait to see how silkie feathers look! A local emu farmer gave me some emu feathers -- those leave a very distinctive mark, of course.
The textural lines are actually from burnishing, which is where you align the platelets of clay in one direction to give it a soft sheen. I'm better at it now so it doesn't look so ridged. Ugh. This piece is very personal to me but the more I look at it the more I dislike it, except the awesome feather placement. *lol*
Two of ChuChu's feathers on the back with some Xandy hair squiggles.
This is the kind of detail the feather imprint gives. Isn't that incredible? This is what I have for my avatar here.
A crappy photo of the bottle I did last summer. I sold this one to my uncle so I can't take better pictures. I used an underglaze to give it some color. I like the shape on this one far better than the other.
I auctioned off a personalized horsehair pot last fall to benefit BEAT Riding Center (the non-profit therapeutic stable I work at). The person who won the auction gave me hair from their horse who had died suddenly of cancer last year to make the pot with. It was really special to make that.
