Bio
I am a potter who wandered into precious metal clay and then finding that limiting, decided to take silversmithing classes at the Boca Raton Museum of Art. I fell in love with gemstones and with metal. I ventured on from there to a local Gem & Mineral Society here in Palm Beach County, Florida and learned how to cut stones. I am still a member to this day.
My first love of pottery kindled my love to play with fire in the Raku process, and silversmithing has pushed it further with the use of a torch.
I still enjoy both working in clay and metal and exploring the differences of the two mediums.
Luckily, I live way out in the boonies with my family,my chickens, and my dog, where my neighbors find it perfectly normal to have a burn pile going. They just don’t know mine usually has clay at the bottom!
About Majolica Pottery:
Majolica is a style and process that's dates back to 9th century Islam and was brought into Italy in the 13th century via a spanish island named Majorca. Thus the spanish name Majolica.
A white base glaze is applied to a red earthenware and oxides are used to paint over the white base. The technical term for this process is called "in-glaze".
Italy made this type of pottery famous in places such as Duarta, but many cultures have adopted this style such as the famous faience ware, delftware and Minton majolica.
About Raku Pottery:
The making of Raku ware was initiated by Chojiro, the first generation of the Raku family, during the Momoyama period in Japan (1573-1615). He became acquainted with tea-master Sen no Rikyu and started making tea bowls for the tea ceremony and raku came into being.
American Raku differs in a number of ways, most notably the process of smoking the ware outside the kiln after firing. The fired pieces are taking directly from a hot kiln and placed in an air tight container with combustible materials and starving the atmosphere in the container of oxygen. This is called a reducing atmosphere. Raku pieces may also be quenched with water to create a crackling of the glaze.
The American Raku process produceses interesting copper-lusters ,smoke penetration, lime ghost imaging, and many other beautiful glazing techniques.
Member of the WWAO:
http://worldwidewomenartists.com/
