Upcoming Pit firing

We are on Spring Break for this next week and since we have had rain most of this week, we have not been able to fire the burnished pots. It looks like the weather will allow us to fire them this next week so we are aiming for Monday. I am assisting my student teacher at his house since this technique is new to me also.

Pit firing is a great way to finish off burnished pots. The pots will have the black and grey smoke marks from being in contact with the smoke and combustible materials. Other colors such as a warm red, yellow, and pink colors can be obtained also by adding chemicals into the pit firing.

There are many ways to do a pit-firing. The pots are all affected by many variables such as type of pit firing, clay used, fuel used, chemicals added, and the altitude where they are fired.

A pit can be of any size from small enough for one person to fill or large enough for hundreds of pots. We will be using a galvanized tub purchased at Home Depot for approximately $20.

The firing usually takes 3-4 hours.

This information is taken from the book Low-firing and Burnishing by Sumi von Dassow.

I will shoot photos of the process to upload in more detail. Here are a few general ones for a "sneak a peek".

Photos by Steve Revill

Examples of Burnished Pottery

All students have completed the burnishing of their pots. The burnishing process, working in a 50 minute class period, took almost two weeks. They have been fired to the low temperature of cone 018, which is approximately between 500 and 600 degrees, in my kilns at school. We used Lizella clay which is an earthenware clay and fires orange in color.

The photos below are of my students' work. Lizella clay is used which fires to an orange color and is an earthenware clay.

Slip, which is a clay and water mixture, can be used to apply decoration to the pot or designs can be incised or scratched into the clay.

This is a close up of a pot before it is fired and then after it has been fired. Notice the orange color.

It is hard to see but there is a shiny glossy look to the pots due to the burnishing. The clay body looks like it has been glazed but has not.

The final step now is to pit fire them. My student teacher loaded them today to take home. Unfortunately, rain is in the forecast for most of the weekend so we will have to wait to fire them. The finished products will be posted later. They will be black instead of orange.

More information on burnishing a pot

This can be done in two ways: rubbing or polishing a pot with something very smooth like a polished stone and coating the pot with terra sigillata and rubbing it with a soft material such as a chamois cloth. It is a process which begins after the pot is constructed. It is first smoothed with a spatula or rib and then when the pot is beginning to dry, the polishing process is begun. The back side of a spoon can be used first and then when the pot is leather hard, polished stones are used. Oil and water can also be used to achieve a very smooth, polished look. The result of burnishing is a beautiful shine on the clay pot. This shine is just the clay itself. A design can be incised into the clay or painted on with slip.
Two of my Ceramics classes are in the final stages of this process. We have just fired two kilns with these pots. The kiln fires to cone 018 which is a low temperature. These pieces are not to be used as functional pieces as they are not fired to vitrification which is where the clay changes chemically and physically to a state where the clay will hold water. They are very beautiful.
The next step is for my student teacher, Steve, to take them home to pit fire. More information on this is coming. A great book on both burnishing and pit firing is Low-firing and Burnishing by Sumi von Dassow.

Pottery - Learning how to burnish clay

This is a great blog and is extremely comprehensive. Great techniques are posted. My student teacher is currently teaching a project where my students will burnish their pot and then he will take the pots home to "pit fire". The end result will be a black pot which has a slick shiny surface in some areas and is just beautiful. This type of firing cannot be done in a kiln which is in my classroom. We even checked and it cannot be done on school property. So, I am learning all about this process. I'll keep you posted on the results.
http://ceramicartsdaily.org/

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