patience = virtue = success!

Tra la! My second firing was a success! The photo above shows the piece before fusing. And, voila, lookee this!!!

The piece fused beautifully, and it's my first created from the pattern bar edge slices I have posted earlier. Now after clean up the edges (by grinding and polishing), I will have my first piece that will be a part of a new textile and glass work I am designing.

Here it is as it greeted me when I opened the kiln (thrilling moment):


In the pre-firing picture, you can see that the edges pieces had a matte finish. They had not been exposed when the pattern slab was created. The fusing process brought them to a nice glossy finish, like that of the surrounding black glass. As well, I had readjusted the alignment when I wrapped and dammed the piece, and there are no holes.

Building on the "I see it" statement in the glass (completely inadvertent on my part, but a nice happy accident), I am now designing some face shapes for bas relief glass pieces -- they will be "seeing it" [whatever 'it' is]. I'll also make some more pieces with the pattern bars. And I'll play with the thermofax screens I posted yesterday.

Not all at the same time. I am teaching at the Osher Institute at California State University Channel Islands, so art time will be interspersed with preparation...this statement is an excuse to introduce some cool photos I took last week. They feature a very shallow fountain in front of CSUCI's new architectural-design-award-winning library.