Ceramics week 8

First task was to take stock of what's in my boxes of work - some finished and glazed, some dried out, some bisque fired -
Could any of the stairs fit in with the mountain of translucent cubes...
One task is to set up the items I'm not going to use "as in an exhibition" and photograph them, then print the photos large for presentation in the portfolio. I had a go, but this will have to happen later, when the final project is further along -
For the final project, I'm rolling out porcelain very thin, making rectangles for the "rickety steps" that will climb up my translucent mountain on their skinny bamboo legs, and putting a subtle pattern on in various ways. I discovered that by wrinkling the bottom and top cloths when rolling out the clay, both sides get a pattern - here's the before -
and the after -
You can put nails or other small items on top of the cloth, and rolling will give you a pattern - without the nails becoming embedded in the clay.

If you put nails underneath as well, there will be holes where nails cross - I need to make some more of those (and to try out paper clay for this).

The porcelain was torn, not cut, into rectangles to give crumbly edges, and pierced to make holes for the bamboo sticks. These are ready for firing straight to stoneware. I might make a few more with glaze or with bits of wire in them -
The stairs have been glazed - matte, shiny, tinglaze, and a combination - wonder what they'll look like. I haven't developed a sense of the effect of glazes yet, and until that happens, won't be able to really plan a piece. So far it's been about the shape or even the concept, rather than the finished piece itself.