How a Commission Inspired a New Collection
A couple of months ago I was contacted by Mark & Julie who wanted to commission me to make an urn for the ashes of Julie’s Mum, who sadly passed away recently due to Covid.
I felt so honoured to create a unique sculptural urn that would hold a special place in their heart to commemorate a beloved family member.
They requested an urn in the form of a cat as Julie’s Mum had loved cats, in particular, tabby cats. I also have a tabby cat, in fact I had 2 cats a brother and a sister called Indy & Lupin. Sadly Lupin was run over when she was only 11 months old.
So this particular commission had a special meaning for me as I used images of my own cats as inspiration.
I started by adding wax resist to the areas I wanted to remain black, as during the Raku process any parts of the sculpture without glaze will absorb the carbon form the sawdust and go black. I really enjoyed painting on the glazes in a tabby design!
I used my large front loading gas kiln to Raku fire the urn. I carefully placed the body and the head onto stilts to be sure that the glaze would not run and stick to the kiln shelf.
Now for the exciting bit of taking the urn out of the kiln whilst it’s still red hot and smoking in sawdust.
Once the Cat Urn was removed from smoking in the sawdust, it was time to clean it and see the end result!
Completed Cat Urn
As I wanted to try out the glazes before I actually glazed the cat urn here’s how the test piece came out (right).
I was so pleased with the both the test piece and the urn that I decided to create a new collection of cat sculptures which are now available in my online store!
