ArtFire

This bowl is hand built using a mold for the initial form and then manipulating the clay as it settled into shape by pulling and twisting the clay into new shapes - kind of a balance between telling the clay what I wanted it to do and letting it tell me what it wanted to become. Because I love to play with multiple colors of clay I used marbled coils of Black Mountain and a tan clay called Rods Bod to build this bowl on the mold. Once I had the shape I wanted I blended the coils together on the exterior side to give the form both a new texture and additional strengthen. As I was blending the clay it started to form little wavelets so those appear near the edges of the bowl. I fuss with the edges throughout the whole shaping process, twisting and blending the clay until feels "right" to me. In this case it really wanted to curl over and back toward its base so this bowl has a very rolling hills / wave like feel to it. The last step before allowing it to dry on the mold was to add a triskel (three sided) foot to the base.

Once the piece was dry enough to come off the mold I added a line of porcelain slip to accent the spiraling coils on the inside.

The bowl is coated in the deep earth color glaze - Cooper Red. I kept the glaze away from the very center of the bowl so that the rich contrast of clay colors could be easily seen, then wiped the glaze up towards the edges so that it would increase in intensity as it went. I then added a light drizzle of Green to Black in a spiral around the inside center and let the glaze drip down the sides. The end result of all the color work gives the bowl very dark ruffles and a very light center. Because of this, this bowl is not recommended for ingested liquids, it is food safe for dry goods like bread and cakes.

This bowl measure 15" in diameter, 4" high from the base to the top most ruffle and 3" deep at the center of the inside well.

This piece has been fired to cone ten and will work as an indoor or outdoor altar piece and if food safe. You can put it through the dishwasher if you need to, though it will eat up most of your space given its size.

This an ideal piece to use as an offering or blot bowl in ritual or to hold cakes. Whatever you choose to do with it, know that it was created with love and a dash of magic to make any moment special.

For additional photos and more information about the artists please visit www.sacred-seeds.net

Clay, Glaze