Monday, April 6, 2015

Monday, April 6, 2015

Decals, Decals, Decals!

A couple of weekends ago I taught a decal workshop at Ruby’s Clay Studio.

Photo by Carol Whitney
Decals really pop against Coco's yellow salt glaze
Love the decals against Ellie's stripes + dragon fly on Nancy's purple mug
Carol's birds sporting their new tattoos
Leah's whale plate - love the repetition and the way the two glazes create perspective
Lots of great ideas here
Dark brown decal visible on black commercial plate
Love the overlap on orange rectangle
Stripes shining through the decal heart on Carol Whitney's mug
Heidi's mug in a series of sidewalk stencils and impressions
Range of decal colorings on a range of commerical pieces - note how faded decal is on right most "antiquey" piece
Blue and green commercial piece - was pleased to see the colors still look great after a cone 1 firing
Decal on bisque piece - still possible I think with some changes in technique
These pieces were fired to cone 1 - decals are black before firing
Decals in action with Deborah and Coco
I think all these techniques were not only tried, but executed beautifully! Thanks Carol Whitney for sending the photo.
Coco's dragonfly on a toasty yellow salt

The range of design ideas and glazes and clay bodies was huge and I learned so much from seeing where people’s imaginations took them, how decals presented themselves, and how different glazes withstood the firing.

I’d also love to give this workshop again (and again!). In the past I’ve taught it at Creative Growth and in Montana at the Clay Arts Guild. I’d love to teach it at other art studios as well as to groups of non-ceramic artists, where either I’d supply the ceramics, or we work with commercial ceramics. If you have ideas of where to teach, please let me know!

Ceramicists, check out this technical page,where I’ve listed everything from where to buy decal paper to troubleshooting glaze inconsistencies.

More decals in action are on my ceramics page and for sale on Etsy.

4 thoughts on “Monday, April 6, 2015

  1. Wow Liz, so much fun! Such nice pieces emerged. I appreciate your generosity in sharing this! Thanks for the pictures too. Your Miles bowl Coco, it’s a keeper!

  2. Glad you enjoyed it, Carol! And thanks so much for taking pics of the workshop in progress. I love your decal birds.

  3. Was at Goodwill, thought these pots could sure use some decals 🙂
    While Decalomania was a clay workshop, the actual process was different from doing pottery for me. I think Coco mentioned how calm and soothing decalling was- kids in art class. Select images, layout, print, plan out placement, arrangement, cutting, slipping on; all this can be a separate craft in of itself, kinda feels like scrap booking pots. Thankfully, Sensei Liz did the hard part of layout and printing –arigato, danka, graci!
    While throwing and hand building are fun, sometimes the creation part can be stressful as the output doesn’t always turn out as planned. Drat! Plus it takes sooo looooong…. But with decals, new life and love can be breathed again on recycled pots by folks who may not even be “into” ceramics. The instant gratification, accessible nature kinda reminds me of those painting pottery workshops. If I had known decaling before, I might have skipped all the agony of learning to throw, argh! Liz Sensei, your next early retirement plan: Decalomania startup! Thanks again for a wonderful Worthy workshop.

    • Tony, thank you for your awesome and encouraging comment! : ) I love the way you described the process as “scrap booking pots”.

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