The flames lick up the sides of the glazed pitcher, and the pot is suddenly gone — disappearing inside the thick smoke just before Pam Bingham caps the can with a lid.

And here it sits — and smokes — for nearly half an hour as the process of raku works its magic on the pottery.

Last weekend, 18 students and nine instructors gathered at Muddy Creek Studio outside of Haines for a three-day workshop on raku, a technique that originated in Japan.

This workshop happens once a year, said Terri Axness, who owns Muddy Creek Studio and organizes the weekend through Crossroads Carnegie Art Center with Kevin Flynn of Boise.

It’s become quite a popular event, said Ginger Savage, executive director of Crossroads.

“It’s almost always filled up (for next year) the day after it ends,” she said. “Crossroads really appreciates Terri, Dennis (Axness) and Kevin Flynn and all their hard work on this workshop.”

Each participant prepared pots beforehand, making their creations and then doing an initial bisque firing.

For functional pottery such as bowls and plates, the pots are fired twice — first a bisque firing and then, after being glazed, a high-temperature firing to several thousand degrees.

Raku, on the other hand, is a low-fire technique with pots heating to a range between 1,400 to 1,800 degrees.

Once the pottery reaches the desired temperature, the artists “pull” the pots out with long-handled tongs and place the pieces into a prepared combustion chamber (garbage can or sand pit lined with rolled newspaper and cardboard).

As the hot pot sits in the heat and smoke, cracks form in the glaze and those fissures are infused with smoke, creating a pattern.

Each piece is unique

The outcome is never guaranteed.

“Everything’s an experiment — you can’t have expectations,” said Elizabeth Munding, who is originally from North Dakota but is at the end of a four-month stint in Baker City with the U.S. Forest Service.

While here, Munding has signed up for a number of art and yoga classes.

“All the art you can do in this town is incredible,” she said. “This community is really amazing.”

Throughout the three-day workshop, various instructors took turns teaching different raku techniques.

“Everybody here is an expert in one area,” said Matt Sather. “We really get great exposure to different techniques.”

Sather and his wife, Melodee, live in Boise. They have shown their art at Crossroads, and as members take classes at a discounted rate.

“It benefits us as artists, and it benefits (Crossroads),” he said. “Baker’s art community is pretty phenomenal.”

The Sathers shared their knowledge of “naked raku,” which means dipping the pot in a slip (liquid clay) instead of a glaze.

Inside the kiln, that slip dries faster than the pot and shrinks, creating cracks that will then be filled with smoke in the combustion chamber.

After just one or two minutes, those pots — still too hot to touch — are pulled from the ashes and dipped in water. The cracked slip flakes off and reveals the design made from smoke.

On a few pieces, the slip didn’t behave quite as expected and resulted in larger areas of black.

“But that’s raku,” Axness said with a shrug. “As long as you have no expectations, you’re tickled with whatever happens.”

See more in the June 22, 2016, issue of the Baker City Herald.