ALaW techniques for UVW

My last letters for ALaW 2010, somewhat overdue! 5 weeks to be exact, but who's counting...

U - Woodcut Print with underglaze

I've been at this one to conquer for sometime now, with each attempt amounting to dissapointment. And you could say that it was U that held up progress (plus xmas, new year etc...) to completing my ALaW in time. Not wanting it to get the better of me, I left it until I had optimine time to devote 100% head space to retry.

My adjustments I needed to re-address were (and many);

• The initial carving needed to be deeper, so off to buy real (sharp) woodcut tools!
• Always remember to carve your letter backwards, just as well the first attempt was a fizzer (and on a test tile).
• Re-adjust the thinking to clay and not paper as in the workshop, of course Kim...this should have been your first thought, huh.
• Using black underglaze (not ink) resulted in different tackiness, well no tackiness at all actually. Hence the printing ink roller was not suitable, out with the sponge roller, a test run, and wolla, yay, as easy as that!

The techniques for the next two letters are taken from this idea of the woodcut print process, minus or adding some steps to suit the clay.

V - Negative Print with red porcelain slip

Instead of carving into wood I've carved deeply and directly into the clay with a carving tool. Then with a sponge roller loaded with red porcleain slip, I've rolled over the clay tile to print a negative letter V. Being careful not to get any slip into the carved letter, as in the ink printing method.

W - Negative carving with black underglaze

Reverse to V - Instead of carving the letter first I carved it last. Using the sponge roller again, this time loaded with black underglaze I've rolled over the whole tile completely covering it with black. When touch dry I've transfered the letter W into the clay tile (gently) to make an imprint, then carved the letter and border.