We have just begun firing. After three months of hard work by Isezaki Sensei, Koichiro-san (his son), Kibata-san (the oldest apprentice), Ishida-san (the other apprentice), Hatori-san (an employee who mostly handles the wrapping and shipping of finished work, but also helps where ever needed), and myself, this the culmination. Last week we loaded hundreds of Sensei’s pieces into the kiln. While in many places in Japan and around the world the firing’s primary purpose is to transform the clay into ceramic and the applied glazes into hard glass, in Bizen the firing as another purpose as well. Traditionally no glazes are used on the pottery and so it is the firing itself which gives the work its finished patina. To be more accurate, it is the interaction of the clay, the form, the loading and the firing which patina the work. In Japanese the term for this kind of work is ‘yakishime.’ In english, as is often the case with woodfired ceramics, we do not have one concise word for it, though it is usually referred to as ‘natural ash glazed ceramics.’

Isezaki Sensei's Anagama



Because the path of the flame through the kiln and wares in extremely important in determining what the final results will be both on individual pieces as well as on the kiln load as a whole, great care is taken during the loading and much consideration is given to directing the flame. During the firing the flame behaves much like water, taking the path of least resistance, speeding up as it constricts, swirling and eddying as it flows around the wares.
Loading the back of the kiln


This style of kiln is called an ‘anagama’ and is basically a tube running at an incline up a hill. The pitch of anagama kilns vary a great deal but Sensei’s is fairly steep, almost completely eliminating the need for a chimney. Infact, the chimney on this kiln is only about two feet tall.
For the next ten days we will take turns stoking the kiln continuously in eight hour shifts. Typically during kiln firings my favorite shift is the overnight shift because of the stillness, but this time Ishida-san and I are on the 4 pm to Midnight.

Sensei pulling a teabowl from the kiln as the kiln approaches top temperature. Each firing a few pieces are selected for this technique which is called 'hikidashi.' The results are dramatically different from the work left in the kiln to cool naturally.


Excavating clay from under a local rice field.

Bizen clay, often dug from under local rice fields, has very high levels of organic matter. Therefore, the temperature of the kiln must be raised very slowly in order to burn out these impurities. If the temperature goes up to quickly, the escaping gasses can cause bloating. We are currently raising the temperature by 5 degrees celsius per hour.


This style of firing is incredibly labor intensive, somewhat unpredictable, and relatively expensive. However, as you see in my next post, the results speak for themselves.

More pictures are at picasaweb.google.com/superduperdog3


Some of my work

Thanks for reading!

Eric
Subscribe to: Posts (Atom)