Brenda McMahon •° Blue Moon Clay Studio

2242 Rte 113. Greenwich, NY

www.BlueMoonClay.com

Saggar Firing Workshop
What to bring/How to prepare

The saggar workshop is a 2-day firing intensive workshop. The first day will be a loading and firing day; the second day will be unloading, reviewing results, discussing burnishing and surface treatment techniques and how to build a saggar and kiln.

Each student is encouraged to bring between 4 – 6 bisque (08 – 05) pots; it is suggested the work is made with white stoneware (cone 6 or cone 10) and at least some of the pieces should be burnished. Thrown, hand built and sculptural pieces are welcome. Work should be of varying sizes, from miniatures (2”) to no larger than 6”. The more pieces you can get fired, the more you will learn, so many smaller pots yields more information than fewer larger ones.

Saggars:

Students should bring their own saggars. You have a few choices:

  1. Make your own saggar. You can throw, coil build or make a slab saggar. Saggars should be between 8” & 10” cylinder in the shape of a bucket. A lid can be made or a plate or kiln shelf can act as a lid. Saggars should be made of raku or coarse clay. Drill 6 to 15 -½” holes around the perimeter of the greenware chamber (much like a colander – try using an exacto knife), then bisque your saggar to cone 06 (don’t worry if there are too many holes in the saggar, they can always be plugged up). The saggar should be large enough to hold the pots you will be firing.
  2. Old pots with cracks can act as a saggar. The saggar must be large enough to hold the piece you want to fire, the cracks or broken areas can act as the “holes” so these saggars will not need to be drilled.
  3. Saggars should be made of ceramic material. Saggars can also be made of firebrick, foil or a slurry cocoon surrounding the piece you’re firing. Make sure you bring enough saggars to hold your pots.

Natural Materials:

One of the many joys and surprises of smoke firing is the materials used to get the surface results. Color on saggar work is one thing, but surface design is another. This is achieved through the use of many all-natural materials. Here are a few suggestions:

  1. Natural Material. Grass, hay, flowers, palm leaves just to name a few. Fresh, as well as dried material is good. Bring some of both. Make sure the fresh material was picked the day of the workshop. The results achieved from fresh leaves and fern can be delightful. Chunky and thick items, like acorns, smell good but do not yield much result. Consider that you want to wrap your organics close to your work without scratching the surface, so select material accordingly.
  2. Sawdust. This is available at the Art Center. Trimmings from a wood turner are always nice and a variety of density sawdust (flour dust to coarse sawdust) works well.
  3. Seaweed, Etc. Fresh seaweed is great. It should be air dried, so you can collect it a few days ahead of the workshop. Animal feed and mineral supplements for animals works well (this often has copper and iron in it).
  4. Metallics. Copper wire, any and all gauges are good to work with; coarse steel wool and any other metallic not mentioned.
  5. Organics. Grasses, green & dry; hay, straw, banana peels (potassium) (air dry them), nut shells, corn husks, all of this and more can have an effect.
  6. Rope, twine, wire. We will be ‘wrapping’ many of the pots in a variety of ways. Rope and twine literally hold the bundles together and burn away in the firing, they also allow for interesting line design on the surfaces. Foil, burlap and other materials also help hold the organics and other stuff close to the pot.
  7. Bring surprises, we can all learn from your experiments.

Weekend Agenda:

Day One: Review philosophy of Saggar firing. Review materials and how to use them. Load saggar. Fire saggar. Throwing Demo/Slide Show of Thailand & Ceramic Arts.

Day Two: Unload saggars. Review results & discuss. How to build a saggar & kiln. Burnishing and surface treatment techniques.