I have some works in an upcoming exhibition in Canberra. #Pottery

Lizard

Big lump of feldspar with quartz and schorl from near Broken Hill. I wish I had a ball mill.

Teeny ash glazed porcelain pot. Some of that malachite was included in the glaze, but the green colour doesn't really show as the glaze needs to be very thin on miniature pots. #Pottery

Butterfly from this morning's walk.

SiC celadon attempt 2. Added more water to get a thinner glaze, looks ok now. A few darker specs are from the silty clay I found. #pottery

Hyacinth orchid near Bonang. I want to try to get that spotted pink colour in a glaze.

Sandstone close-ups

Clay resupply

Latest test batch of SiC celadon was too thick, and the results were pretty wild. #pottery

Baby jumping spider in the glaze bucket. Spider is now outside.

Nice lump of quartz from near Wee Jasper.

New project

Tiny Amphora of Great Intelligence (AGI) Terracotta with mineral paint #Pottery

Trilobite bowl. Unfortunately cracked on the inner. The outer is decorated with a mix of hematite, azurite and clay, with the pattern scratched in. #pottery

Rhodonite pieces. I want to make a manganese based glaze the same colour.

Rescued this little one from the clay bucket.

Crappy photo but at least I saw it. Aurora over Canberra.

Peacock spider climbing a wall

Random flowers from the garden

Erythrite. Contains cobalt, and can be used as a pigment, but needs to be carefully heat treated first in small amounts because it fumes arsenic.

Shit like this is hilarious until someone uses AI for the technical documentation.

Poppies

Current work in progress. Silty clay from near Yass, NSW. It burnishes really well. Waiting for it to fully dry so I can carve it.

Wolframite. Contains iron, manganese and tungsten. It might make some interesting colours in a floating glaze.

Looking forward to this exhibition

More experiments with glass on pottery. Most of the glass ended up on the kiln cookie.

Doughnut flutes with wood ash and wild clay glaze. All of them survived the firing, though only the one with the bulge at the top still sounds ok. #pottery

Ceramic bead necklace WIP. Glazing the beads was a pain, and I had to break a lot of the smaller beads that got stuck to the wire.

Experimenting with weird flute shapes, praying the kiln gods are merciful. #pottery

Clay resupply

Little mud wasp. They sometimes steal my clay, and also like to build nests inside mini bottles.

Baryte, barium sulphate crystals. Not as versatile in glazes as barium carbonate, but much less toxic.

Cassiterite, crystal form of tin oxide.

Petrified wood up close

Canberra orchids

Pyrolusite crystals up close. This is the main source of manganese I use in glazes.

Melted a dead cockroach in the kiln. I'm not sure if the iron oxide was from the bug or just dust. There is a patch where it has formed a glaze that crazed slightly. Dead bugs could be a viable glaze ingredient.

Bottle with manganese, dolomite and wood ash glaze. I'll try this glaze on red clay next, as it would probably look better. #pottery

Mini porcelain pots with copper, barium and wood ash glaze. #pottery

Bowl with pink glaze coloured with green glass and tin, with glass melted into the bottom. Even after putting the ground glass though a fine sieve the glaze is a little lumpy, but it makes a nice colour.

Experimental sphalerite crystal glaze. I got some crystals a few millimeters long, next time I will try a thicker glaze with a longer firing. The zinc seems to have all melted into the glaze, there are a few dark specs that are probably from iron.

They survived the firing. The white underglaze doesn't self-glaze at cone 6 (which works fine in this case), all the other colours do. #pottery

Rocks now partially melted after cone 6 firing

Tiny rocks that are about to be test fired in the kiln.

At Floriade

Our backyard pond is full of huge tadpoles.

Lump of syenite. I might be able to make a decent glaze out of it.

Hematite separated out from clay, first by levigation, then by running a Nd magnet over the rocks left behind. Can be ground up and mixed with a small amount of clay to make paint.

Bits of malachite from Burra, SA (along with a random piece of chrysophrase).