Shirley Clifford

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Artist's Statement

The sheer simplicity of clay and at the same time its mystical complexity have seduced me into its drama. On one hand, you just dig it out of the ground, give it some shape and form, and fire it -- earth, water, fire. And yet, on the other hand, there are myriad methods of manipulating the composition of the clay body, endless ways to give it form and substance and decoration, and then more ways to fire it - from low-fire Raku techniques to high-fire reduction processes to temperatures of 2300 F or higher.

This past year I have revisited my long-love for SHINO glaze and have been working in reduction firing with porcelain. This led me to work with woodfiring in anagama kilns in Japan 2003. My goal was to investigate my Japanese heritage by working with and interacting with artists from Japan and other countries.

RAKU HOLDS A SPECIAL PASSION FOR ME. The work is fired outside in my backyard to about 2000 F (you bake a cake a 350 F). While the glaze is red-hot and molten, the piece is carefully moved onto a stand with tongs and sprayed with a chemical to get the orange lustre effect. Then the final stage is moving the piece into an air-tight chamber of sawdust and letting the smoke give definition to the pattern of crackles which are formed from the thermal shock of going from extreme hot to air temperature. This process is extremely exciting and dangerous and fraught with possibilities for failure - immediate and enticing.

Just recently the Raku firing has led me on to another process: sawdust fuming firing. Smoothly polished bisqued (cone 08) unglazed porcelain vases are buried in wood and sawdust with various chemicals and organic matter and are fired rather quickly. The colourful flames of blue-green, orange and fuchsia impart their blushes onto the porcelain giving a surreal surface like watercolours.

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