WildFire MudWorks | Dave Sawyer | Traditional and Raku Fired Ceramic Art and Gifts

The Red Wolf

Background and “in progress” photos

 

The Red Wolf

Featured in the WildFire ‘23 exhibition at the Artists Collective|Spartanburg

 
 
 

The Red Wolf … $500

Along with birds.  Bears, wolves, and horses make up the top four of my favorite subjects. This work, features the Red Wolf, once a prolific predator that roamed from Texas to New York but is now limited to a total wild population just under two dozen found in a small portion of coastal North Carolina.  You can learn about the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Department’s efforts to save the Red Wolf at https://www.fws.gov/project/red-wolf-recovery-program

This entire work is approximately 17” by 20” and the mandala is 15” by 11”. It is constructed by hand from an off-white earthenware clay body. It was bisque fired to cone 04 (1945 degrees F), then glazed with three coats of mid-temperature glazes and traditionally glaze fired to cone 6 (2201 degrees).

Here are some “in progress” photos as I was working on its design through completion.

original working sketch

Greenware after carving

After the bisque firing

Glazed and ready for glaze firing

After glaze firing and construction