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Mixing Green Beans with Brown
Part Two of a Multi-Part Tutorial on Fusing and
Compatibility
Click here to go to the
first part of this article.
I spent
hours (well, maybe fifteen minutes) artfully arranging my scraps in
the kiln. I made sure that every area was covered at least a couple
of layers thick. I fired the kiln carefully, peering through the
peephole to make certain that all was well. I watched the scraps
melt down, fusing together, until the surface was shiny and smooth
as cheese on top of a casserole. Then, with the kiln still closed,
I carefully allowed the glass to cool, not too fast, just like all
the books say. I kept one eye on the kiln and and the other alert
for stray dogs and children to shoo away.
What
happened was a disaster. Instead of a colorful, smooth mixture, I
got cracks. I even heard a ping or two, and once a crack emerged
while I held the cooled piece in my hands. All my work, all for
nothing.
It was as
though my bean casserole was burnt. Even worse, as though parts
were burnt and parts were uncooked, and parts turned into something
else altogether. Inedible. Worse than inedible, it was so ugly you
couldn't serve it even if it were edible.
That's how
I discovered glass incompatibility.
Take a moment to check out this wonderful example (and I mean
wonderful in only the best sense) of glass incompatibility.
This is what happens if you fuse Bullseye and Spectrum glass
together! (And yes, those curved lines are cracks.)
Photo courtesy of glass artist Deb Compton.
Click here to go to the
next part of this article, which talks about what compatibility is
and how to test to make sure that two glasses can be fused together.
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Copyright 2005 Brad Walker.
All rights reserved.
This article was originally
written in 1999 and was one of a series that became the basis for the
Warm Glass website. A
version of the article has also been published in Common Ground: Glass, the
newsletter of the International Guild
of Glass Artists.
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