AusBonsai

I have been taking "lessons" in ceramic art and so far I have made two ceramic art pieces and about 60 bonsai pots. A reasonable percentage I think!
What is interesting to me is that there appears to be a trend by Aussie potters in making "earthy" pots for Australian native bonsai, to suit the "wide brown land" look. While this is a reasonable approach there are many lush environments that would require a more colorful pot finish in my opinion.
With this in mind I have been experimenting with different glazes for Aussie pots. In the following photos the pot construction is not important, it is the type of finish to the pots that is the key and I would appreciate your thoughts.

One thing I did learn, don't fire a earthen ware glaze to stoneware temperatures. There is much cleaning up to be done afterwards.

Totally agree with you Watto. Some nice colours in some of those pots, my favourites are 28, 29 & 30.
Cheers, Frank.

Hey Watto,
Well done on expanding your skills and knowledge on all things bonsai.

I reckon the colours and glazes of pots for Australian pots is limited only by the imagination. Sure there's the wide brown land premise but there's also the colours of the coast, the vibrancy of the rainforests ... the list goes on...

The glazes that take my eye in your collection are the bottom two 28 and 30. That deep blue pot with a muddy wash is beautiful. Indeed, I have a large Australian-made pot of similar colour potted with Cassie's and I love.

Keep exploring colours, I reckon.

Mark

Great post Watto. I particularly like the colours in pic 29. I grew up in the Adelaide Hills and the soft green, creams and browns are really evocative.

A couple of my own trees are deliberately meant to reflect trees or landscapes of my youth, and a glaze or texture that can capture that really adds something.

Keep experimenting. Australia has some interesting colours, textures and light and it would be good to capture something of it.

Matt.

I'm always a sucker for pots with greenish blue glazes...good to see your experiments!

I was so lucky as to be given one of his pots by Watto. The glaze caught my attention straight away, it was just so beautiful. I guess you'd call it blue with an undertone of gold, but it's a subdued blue and not evenly applied, so that you get different gradations as you turn the pot. I've been trying for hours to get a reasonable photo of it, but that proved very difficult. Well, here's the result, for better or for worse.
Lisa

Thank you all for your comments.
The blue brown/black colours of pot 30 really struck me and I hope to replicate that colour in a much larger and "proper" pot in the coming weeks/months. Its nearly time for my course to cease for the year but I hope to get a few more out of the kiln before "break up" (its like being back at school - I still have to go to the naughty corner occasionally but not as often as in the old school days).