Smoke-Fired 燻燒
A modern twist of the ancient firing technique
Smoke-firing is a very old pottery firing technique, which leverages the smoke that comes with firing wood or other carbon-rich materials to create natural patterns, colors, and effects. This technique has many other sibling methods such as Raku, pit-firing, etc, which are all similar approaches.
To do smoke-firing, one would usually create a temporary outdoor kiln because you don’t want to fill your studio with all that smoke. While it’s fun, it has many uncontrollables that would affect the look of your work. My smoke-firing approach is different and is done indoor in an electric kiln. I would also apply low-fire glazes and gold luster to decorate my work and give it a very modern look.
My career in ceramics started with smoke-firing. Many of the design elements during this period got evolved and have grown to many other interesting ideas later on.
為古老恬靜的靈魂穿上時尚動感的衣裳
「燻燒」是一種非常古老的陶器燒製方式，利用燃燒薪材、木頭後所產生的碳黑素，自然地在土坯上燻出別緻的紋樣，那種天然的紋理、色澤和溫潤感是釉藥所無法展現的。不過也因為如此，大多數的燻燒陶作品只能以黑色、古樸的模樣呈現，燻染上去的紋路也無法操控。
為了打破這種限制，提供燻燒作品更豐富的面貌，我努力鑽研各種可拿來燃燒產生碳素的媒材，試驗了各種水溶性化合物可產生的色彩表現，獨創出以鋁箔紙包覆的燻燒法，並以此為主題，在1995年發表了我的研究所碩士畢業論文。
傳統的燻燒法需在戶外做窯，燃燒產生的高溫和二氧化碳令人難耐，但我的燻燒法可以在室內以電窯進行，省時省力，而且去除了許多燒窯中無法控制的變因，正因為這樣突破性的技法讓我的作品色彩豐富，圖案變化多端，還能與釉藥一起呈現，加上純金水的點綴，使原本古樸的燻燒黑陶搖身一變成為時尚、現代、亮麗的彩陶作品。
我的陶藝旅程，由燻燒開始，許多這時期的創作元素都在日後的各系列中延續並越加成熟。