Raku from SLO's October First Friday

San Luis Obispo has a tradition of a First Friday Art Walk. Anam Cre Ceramics Studio sponsors their raku firing in the parking lot on that evening and it is a lot of fun. My outputs from the process include some refined efforts with copper, metallic flash and smokey lilac glazes. There was another factor at play this last Friday; Balkan raku which is known as obvara glazing. The obvara firing process, which originated in Eastern Europe around the 12th Century, involves scalding the finish on the pottery to seal the porous surface. Similar to the raku pottery process, a bisqued pot is heated, in this case to 1650°F (899°C) and removed from the heat. The difference is that the pot is then dipped into a specific obvara yeast mixture before being dunked in water to rapidly cool the piece.