Bronze Clay Experiment Part I

I’ve been experimenting with bronze and copper clay lately! While I was getting ready to start with the bronze clay, I thought I’d take some pictures to post here on my blog. The first picture (step 1) is the clay as it comes out of the package, before I’ve done anything to it. Then I took a chunk off, kneaded it a little and rolled it out to about "four cards thick."

The next picture (step 2) is after I’ve rolled the clay and used a brass leaf charm as a template to cut out the leaf pattern and veins. I also cut out a larger outline of the same leaf charm for the backing and put them on my mug warmer to dry. After the pieces have dried they’re leather-hard and this is when I do all my filing, additional shaping, clean-up work and then “glue” the two pieces together with bronze clay slip that I made by mixing a small amount of clay and clay filings with a little water. 

At this stage each clay is different. Silver clay has no flexibility and will break easily. Copper clay isn’t quite as unforgiving as silver, but isn’t as flexible as bronze. After gluing the two pieces together I put it back on the mug warmer to dry again. The leaf in step 3 is ready to go into the kiln, but I need to do some test firing first. More photos to come!

Happy Sunday!