Raku Skulls

Shelley Spranza "made a few of these for a friend, who is a big fan of skulls. This one is Raku fired, which means it was brought up to about 1850 degrees very quickly, then pulled out of the Raku kiln while still hot. While it was hot, I draped individual strands of horsehair over it to give it that neat "squiggly" effect. I painted in the black eyes, nose, and teeth with a low fire glaze before firing."

Raku firing lends it's self to creating unusual patterns on ceramics. The variation of using horse hair to achieve a veined look is unusual and refreshing. With such a visually complicated design, it's great that she kept the skull shape simplified. The use of deep black for the facial details gives a bold break in the pattern of the horse hair. The pattern is almost map like, which leaves my mind wandering and imagining what places the paths would take me to. You can see more of Shelly's work in her Etsy shop.