In addition to Kesl's composition and imagery, there is a good deal about the underglaze and glaze application that accounts for the success of these pots. Unlike the figurative ceramic works of Picasso or the village potters in Mexico, whose work is primarily single stroke, Kesl builds the color over days of patient application. In this particular series, he has incised the features and then added as many as twenty layers of color over a spattered ground, not unlike stucco. Sometimes he thins the color, other times he applies it like cake batter. In two instances, he applied dried out and crushed underglaze like chopped nuts to a freshly painted pool of contrasting color. The result is a complex and vibrant pastiche that responds with satisfying intensity to the later application of glazes.
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