David Jones was born in 1953. From 1970 – 74 he attended the university of Warwick, graduating with B.A. (Hons) in Philosophy and Literature. He is, at present, Senior Lecturer teaching on the B.A. and M.A. courses in the Ceramics Department, Wolverhampton University.
His pots are made form a mixture of porcelain and a heavily grogged clay “T” Material, which has excellent thermal shock characteristics. The pieces are bisque fired in an electric kiln and then decorated with the flexible masking tape to produce a resist pattern. They are sprayed with successive layers of glaze, containing precious metal oxides such as gold and silver. The glost firing is very fast (as little as 15 minutes) in a gas kiln. The objects are removed with tongs and plunged, while still red-hot, into sawdust. This very heavy “reduction” and sudden cooling causes the metal oxides to give up their oxygen and the pure metal can be seen as a thin film on the surface of the pot, surrounded by crazed glaze. The work must then be washed in order to remove the carbonised sawdust.
