Raku Firing
Here I am pulling out a bowl for a high school arts festival. Raku is a process of glaze firing a clay vessel.
The vessel is heated to 1850 degrees. It is pulled out red hot and glowing as the 1850 degree wall hits me as I open the kiln.
The vessel is taken out of the special raku kiln with metal tongs.
Then the vessel is placed in a container that has combustable material like leaves, straw or wood shavings.
The vessel still red hot combusts the material and the bed rages with fire licking and engulfing the vessel.
You can see here a high school student is assisting me. He is holding a lid filled with wood shavings that he will place on top of the little inferno. He will then swivel the lid locking it down in the sand below the combustibles.
This creates a reduction chamber where the fire that is consuming the combustibles thirsts and gasps for oxygen. Since the lid cuts off new atmospheric oxygen coming into the environment the fire looks everywhere for oxygen.
The glazes we use are metallic oxides in composition as well as silica. The fire actually pulls oxygen out of the metallic oxides in the glaze leaving behind metallic wonderous color!
Mostly copper is utilized so the color you see, the brillant reds, greens and metallic lusters derive from this great and immediate process.
I say immediate process because in a traditional clay glaze firing you have to take a day to load the kiln, a day to fire and a day or two to cool down. With Raku, you can not fire a whole great quanity at once, but you can bring the temperature up to 1850 degrees in 40-30 minutes, especially after the first firing. You can pull the peice out and have it cooled down, ready to take home in under an hour and a half.
If you have never seen a raku firing and would like to watch one let me know. I provide raku workshops for Individuals, groups, businesses and artists all the time. If you are having a mid life crisis or need some inspiration, raku is a process you need to experience. It is life changing and thrilling. The process informs team building and inspires any group to work together and think outside the box. Most of my customers thought they could never create art or anything of beauty. They were wrong, very wrong.
I make Raku clay tile, mosaic and beads. I think I am the only one in the world that creates raku clay marbles. You can work with me every step of the process from design to creation to firing of your tile project that will enrich your dwelling, your office or business and provide beauty that has your fingerprints all over it.
Contact me and we can dream it into a reality together.
Chad Everson
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