Claire Landais-Sauvage prepared the clay body for her tea bowl "Sense of Mist” by mixing three ingredients: two wild clays - one red, one green - that she found in old quarries in the Lot region, and a soft white sand she gathered on the banks of a local lake. Over a number of days, she grew the bowl in the palm of her hand, from a single ball of clay, with slow and meditative pressing of the fingers.

Once formed, Landais-Sauvage coated the chawan with a glaze made with ash, ground oyster shells, and a flux. It was then wood-fired in her Cranes kiln to a temperature of around 1000 °C. After cooling, the tea bowl’s surface revealed a landscape of soft cloudy greys and warm blush tones.

The light grey glaze crawled beautifully, giving the impression of a mountain valley mist that grows at dusk. You have a sense of that time of day when light fades and colours blend. But if you look at the tea bowl’s surface again, you notice a delicate web of crazing, like the haze that sparkles when our eyes meet the limits of their perception.

New from the artist’s studio. Comes with Landais-Sauvage’s written account of the tea bowl’s making.