#alchemy from a 1200-year-old Islamic (Rhazes) manuscript (the Book of Secrets) saved his #ceramics? Mostly a how-to on digging, levigating, drying, and tempering clay to make a workable clay body, although at first he’s leaving out the temper in order to get a handle on shrinkage, then uses a charcoal temper; his clay is very brittle and not very plastic. So he adds water from cooking rice to it, opaque with suspended/dissolved rice starch, to improve its workability. As you’d expect, it also seems to add significant elasticity to the clay, although not as much as I would have feared. Then he mixes in ground rice flour and finely chopped hair (as #Rhazes recommends) and charcoal as tempers. But he doesn’t try actually firing it! Dammit. By #Fraser-Builds. #video
on 02024-04-03using the Kitab Al-Asrar by Al-Razi (Rhazes) #Fraser-Builds fixes his clay for #ceramics. #alchemy #video #toread
on 02024-04-03