Bead technology
The bead technique is a basic ceramic technique for building vessels and sculptures out of clay .
Several layers of clay rolls are placed one after the other on a given floor plan. The clay rollers used for this can either be rolled by hand or pressed in an extrusion press. By roughening and slipping (applying slurry with fingers or appropriate tools) the connection point, the various layers are neatly connected. Then the resulting joints are spread over and plastered with soft clay.
Production of a bowl from stoneware using the bead technique
Preparation of the bead
Grooving the bead
prepared bead
Attachment of the bead
Spread the applied bead with the upper edge of the workpiece
the applied bead was connected to the inner upper edge of the workpiece
the attached bead is connected to the outer upper edge of the workpiece
When building vessels, the rollers are built on a base plate that has the desired bottom shape of the later vessel. A base plate can also be used when building a sculpture. But this is not absolutely necessary.
In order to be able to process the ceramic evenly from all sides, the work is usually carried out on a ring washer . In the case of rotationally symmetrical objects, you also have the option of reworking the object on the edge washer, similar to turning, and thus creating a smooth surface.