Mat's Ceramics

Strip melting vase

2010-10-10T12:48:00.001+02:00

These are wheel thrown vases, marbled. They all have bulbous bodies that taper into thin necks. I achieved the spiraling lines on the surface by playing around with the marbling technique. The colours were achieved by the different firing temperatures.

Melting bottle vases

2010-10-10T12:39:00.000+02:00

These are wheel thrown bottle vases. The body of the forms are slightly bulbous and taper into a thin elongated neck. Transparent over red earthenware and fired to 1175°C.

Stencil on white

2010-10-10T12:27:00.001+02:00

This is a thrown white earthenware vase. Just berfore bisque, I apply these stenciled images onto the surface, with use of a black underglaze. These stenciled images tell a narrative story about the night of my brother's murder.

Most Wanted

2010-10-01T17:26:00.000+02:00

This work is very simple and effective. The form was wheel thrown, wide at the shoulders and tapers into a narrow base. It was thrown with a red earthenware clay and painted with a white slip while still leather hard. I then stenciled my face, as well as 'Most Wanted' on to the surface with a black underglaze and glazed to 1080°C.

Buddha sculpture

2010-09-24T18:16:00.001+02:00

Here is a sculpture of the Buddha. After referencing images and other sculptures of Buddha, I found that most of them were made from wood, cement, bronze and even fibre glass, but not many were made from clay. I then modeled and carved one from a lump of clay. I then made a 10 piece mould of it and slip cast it. After bisque, I painted Manganese dioxide in between the grooves on the surface to emphasize the folds and the texture on the clothing and the details in the face as well as in the sculpture as a whole. I then took it to 1080°C to harden the Manganese on the surface.

Warping vases

2010-09-24T17:58:00.001+02:00

I enjoy Marbling clay and then throwing it because it has a different result every time. Although each piece looks the same, they all have a different pattern. The surface decoration in this work is very spontaneous and definately follows the form. The form has a bulbous form that tapers into a thin neck which is then distorted. Glazed inside and out and taken to 1080°C.

Warping vases

2010-09-24T17:44:00.001+02:00

Here I have started to look at ways to play with and distort different vase forms. The form has a bulbous form that tapers into a thin neck which is then distorted directly after throwing, it is distorted mainly at the neck. The vase forms are all wheel thrown and turned, glazed inside and out with a transparent glaze to 1080°C.

White over Terracotta

2010-09-24T17:33:00.000+02:00

Here Is a pot thrown on a Kick-wheel, thrown with a light Terracotta clay, the first piece made in Cape Town. After bisque, I painted a layer of white slip on the surface and sanded down once dried, hardened on at 1080°C.

Michael Vick - Player of the Year

2009-11-19T19:48:00.000+02:00

This is a Trophe sculpture, a cause for animals, that is based on the American football quarter back for the Philidelphia Eagles, in the National Football League, Michael Vick, who was recently arrested for participating in illegal dog fighting tournaments. This sculpture portrays the results of his actions. I modeled this entire piece from clay. I first started off by modeling all 4 limbs, the head and the body separetely. Once this was done, i cut all the parts in half to hollow them out, and joined them back together. I then joined the parts of the dog together and left it to get leather hard to carve the details of the dogs fur, the teeth, the cuts and stitches as well as Michael Vick's jersey and the shoulder pads. I then colored the fur of the dog with oxides, the jersey with a red under-glaze and the "blood" around the mouth with a cherry red under-glaze. I then hand coiled the podium on which the dog sits, Luted the dog to the podium and bisque fired the piece. The "block of wood" on which the dog on the podium sits, was slab-built into a cube of clay, which is hollow as well. The inside of this hollow block has 2 slabs of clay, which i joined in the form of a 90˚ angle cross and joined the edges of it to the inside walls, for support, to prevent distortion in the firing. I then left the block to dry past the leather hard stage and carved the detail of the wood onto the surface. After bisque firing, i rubbed Manganese dioxide and red iron oxide onto the surface to create the appearance of wood and fired it to 1060˚C to harden the oxides to the surface. The gold plate on the block of wood was measured and cut from a leather hard slab of clay. On either side of this plate are carved nails to indicate that they are holding the plate to the wood. I then carved out the writing, which says, "Michael Vick - Player of the year." Once his was done, i bisqued and glaze fired it to 1120˚C. I then applied a gold lustre to the surface and fired it to 750˚C. Gold also resembles first place. In Michael Vick's case, he has achieved a gold trophe for the abuse of animals, which is quite ironic. This sculpture is not to show that he is a victum, but the number one abuser of animals.

24 piece dinner set

2009-11-19T18:57:00.000+02:00

In this work, are 24 pieces for a dinner set. This set consists of 6 square dinner plates, 6 semi-bowls with square rims, 6 bowls with square rims and 6 creme brule bowls with square rims. I began to throw the 6 bowls and the prototypes for the semi-bowls and the creme brule bowls. Once the thrown bowls were leather hard, i began to turn them, when this was done, i measured and cut the rims into squares. Once my prototypes were leather hard, i turned them into shape and made one piece moulds of them. I then slip cast 6 bowls from each mould and measured and cut the rims into squares. With regard to the square plates, i made a 40cm hump mould, rolled out 6 slabs of clay with a thickness of 0.5cm, pressed them onto the hump mould, centered it onto the wheel-head and threw the feet onto the surface. Once my plates were leather hard, i measured and cut them into squares that measure 27cm from rim to rim. After bisque firing all of my bowls and plates, i applied a white opaque glaze to the surface of each item and glaze fired them to 1100˚C. After glaze firing, i applied a poppy on-glaze color to the already fired glazed surface of each item and fired them to 750˚C.

Melting Bottles

2009-11-11T17:17:00.000+02:00

I slip cast 4 of my ready-made Coke bottles and purposely distorted them as I took them out of the mould, i also left the joining seems unfettled or unfinished. After bisque, I took the same glaze that I used for my broken bowls and applied it to the surface of my bottles and fired it to 1100^oC. These bottles may look and feel rough due to the fact that they are unfinished, but the green glaze and the melting effect give them their soft quality.

Broken bowls

2009-11-11T17:11:00.001+02:00

In this work, I threw a lump of clay on the wheel, when it was leather hard, I turned it into a bowl form(solid upside down bowl or prototype) I then removed it from the wheel and made a one piece mould of it. When then mould was dry, I cast 3 bowls and broke it up while still bone dry. After bisque, I applied a peacock green strain to a white opaque glaze, applied it to the surface of my bowls and fired to 1100^oC.

Crystalline vase

2009-11-11T17:04:00.000+02:00

In this post, is a thrown vessel with the use of a crystalline glaze. To give this glaze it’s greenish background, I added Copper Oxide along with Nickel oxide. I then applied the glaze, piling it very thickly around the mouth and neck. I then fired it to a top temperature of 1255^oC and cooled to 1100^oC to achieve larger star-like crystals.

Thrown spiral pots

2009-11-11T16:59:00.000+02:00

These pots were wheel thrown. They have a bulbous body that taper into a narrow neck. After bisque firing, I applied, more or less, an equal balance of maroon and black that spiral upwards from the base of the body to the mouth, in between the maroon and black, the clay body is left unpainted, emphasizing it's natural color. I achieved the maroon color with the addition of red iron oxide and the black with the addition of manganese dioxide. Once my colors were painted on, I took my vases to a stoneware temperature of 1260^oC.

Stenciled Bottles

2009-11-11T16:52:00.000+02:00

Here I made use of ready-made objects, which is a Coka-Cola bottle that I made a mould of and slip cast to stencil on my decorations. I took several sheets of transparency paper and cut out my images, applied them to the bisqued surface of my bottles and sponged black amako and fired them again to harden onto the surface. Once they came out of the kiln, I applied a transparent glaze and fired to 1100⁰C. These bottles stand in a sequence and tell a story from the images. The story is based on the night of Claudio’s(my brother) murder.

Majolica wanna be

2009-11-11T16:47:00.001+02:00

In this post is a platter with an abstract tree with earthy colors in the background, such as green, yellow and blue. It is wheel thrown and turned, with an even wall thickness. After bisque, I applied a transparent glaze and painted these decorations over the wet glaze. I then left my platter to stand over night to prevent crawling and fired it to 1100^oC. The technique is the same as the Majolica technique, but using a transparent glaze.

Claudio's Urn

2009-09-11T18:25:00.000+02:00

This is a Urn that i designed for my late older brother. It was wheel thrown and turned. After it was bisqued, I high-fired a crystalline glaze onto the surface of the body. I carved a lotus bud and added it on the lid and fired it separately to earthenware temperature using a honey glaze to match the honey background color on the body. The writing on the body is my late brother's name (Claudio Sanna), his date of birth and death followed by a message 'from the family', saying "We Love You". The nickel oxide in the glaze give this urn it's blue crystals.

Platters

2009-09-11T18:01:00.000+02:00

These platters were wheel thrown and turned. The platter on the left was colored with oxides and fired to a stoneware temperature of 1260^oC. It is a non-utiliterian piece and is left unglazed as the matt design has an aesthetic appeal and contasts to the slightly shinely, vitrified surface under neath.

The first thing catches ones eye when they see the platter on the right is the dead rat in the centre, this was achieved using the paper resist method. The line decoration around the rat was incised through a purple under-glaze, emphasizing the rat and the humor it creates. This platter was glazes with a transparent glaze and fired to 1100^oC.

Horny Pots

2009-09-11T17:18:00.000+02:00

These Pots were hand built using the coiling method. The type of clay is terrocotta, which was well grogged to strengthen the clay. The horns on the shoulders and the side of the pots are solid and measure up to 7cm long. The pots were pit-fired to blacken them.

Wooden Tea Pots

2009-09-11T16:52:00.000+02:00

These two tea pots were shaped and modelled from a block of clay. I then cut them in half to hollow them out and joined the halves back together to give them a function as well as an appeal. Only the inside is glazed and the outside was carved and coloured with oxides to give it a tree-like appearance.

Torn Buddha face

2009-09-11T16:38:00.000+02:00

In this work, I modelled the Buddha face as one would when building a relief sculpture. I then made a mould of the face and pressed clay into it, hence the term 'press-moulding'. I then made a hole under the chin of the face using a nail thicker than the one in the image above, taking in consideration the shrinkage of the hole in the firing. I nailed it to a block of wood and held the face up using piece of wire that i wrapped around the nail. This piece is 19.5cm high.

Bronze Man

2009-09-11T16:13:00.000+02:00

This bronze sculpture is a conceptual piece, roughly sculpted out of the mind to show my expression. A small sculpture that i slip cast and glazed in bronze. It is 12cm high & 8cm wide. fired to 1080^oC.

Ceramic tree branch

2009-09-10T18:59:00.000+02:00

This branch was shaped and carved from a block of clay and hollowed out before it was bisque-fired. It was then coloured with oxides to create the appearance of a tree branch and finished off with a few layers of Borax and fired to 1080 degrees celcius.

My tea set

2009-09-10T18:45:00.000+02:00

In this work, the handle of my cups are the strongest point, and are emphasized by painting them black. the entire tea set was slip-casted in earthenware, glazed with a white opaque glaze with splashes of black on-glaze to finish it off.

Self sculptures

2009-09-10T18:34:00.000+02:00

These sculptures are self sculptures that were slip-casted in earthenware. Two of the sculptures, on the left and middle, were "marbled" using casting slips that were mixed with oxides to create this effect. The sculpture on the right looks as if it is cracking; i painted a layer of white slip over the already fired piece and re-fired it. All three sculptures were glaze-fired to 1100 degrees celcius with a transparent glaze.