#raku ware

[picard-schreckensberger]

Tea bowl  

Sonyu (artist), 18th century, Japan

clay, thick black glaze, patch of reddish underglaze (Raku ware)

[eliwally]

the art of seduction

[theclaypot]

The Clay Pot now has Raku Parties and Raku Workshops available! Raku is a pottery technique that originated in 16th century Japan. The process results in beautifully unpredictable and intense colors. We invite you to come experience this unique form of pottery at The Clay Pot in Spotswood, NJ. Check out our website for details!

[nihonbeauty]

Japanese Tea Cerimony by soldeace on Flickr.

[dreams-of-japan]

Japanese Tea Cerimony by soldeace on Flickr.

[iipart]

Another piece of raku ware (which I explained before in this post), and another piece I'm really fond of. I love octopuses and sculpting one was definitely rewarding in the end although frustrating while making - it kept falling apart while I made it and during the whole heating and burning phase I was scared to death that one or more of its tentacles would fall of. Luckily it made through the whole process alright and I was positively surprised how the glaze came out! I was supposed to scratch the glaze off after the burning phase but since it came out this nice I didn't bother. Crackles and small holes were an interesting surprise.

[iipart]

Ah, I'm so happy with these! These are raku ceramics - "raku" is very traditional Japanese ceramics in which you burn your raw ware by yourself in a smoker with a "low temperature" (when compared to normal ceramics which are burned in a special, automatic kiln and you don't have to pick wares up from there during the heating process). After that you smoke raku wares, then dip them into water.

Raku is quite full of surprises.. basically anything can happen during the heating process. I, for example, dropped one of these sushi pieces when I tried to lift it with pliers from the kiln. And the glaze never comes out in the way you want to! I was so frustrated when a dragon I made turned out dull brown and green mix when I tried to make it turquoise.

Anyway, I thought sushi would be nice to do with Japanese ceramics. c: I made an ebi nigiri, a maki and an onigiri and I had tremendously fun while making these!