Process

Inside The Studio

The studio is in the Beacon Hill neighborhood of San Antonio, open by appointment, a sunlit room a step up from the garden patio where the ceramics are made. The practice is hand-built, low-fired earthenware finished in modern and vintage glazes, the old ones kept for saturated colors with a depth only age gives. Sometimes Jerry starts without knowing what he will make. The clay gets the first word, and the piece declares itself as the hand keeps moving. Shouganai is the standing agreement: accept what the heat decides and move forward. On the good days it is serendipity, and the Clay Gods are kind.

A patio view of the Locosan studio in Beacon Hill, San Antonio, with finished pieces arranged on a long display.

The Making

How A Piece Is Made

Slow construction, visible hand. The Studio builds by coiling, slab work, pinching, joining, and shaping, keeping the mark of the hand alive on every surface.

The work is hand-built: walls raised from coils or slabs, joined and burnished by hand, the mark of the build kept legible under the glaze. These pieces are made by the hand, plainly and proudly, the slow way the best makers have always valued.

Studio staging table with ceramic pieces and wooden paddles used for shaping clay.

The Glazes

Modern And Vintage Glazes

Old recipes, current work. The glaze language is drawn from recipes older than the studio, chosen for their lush, saturated color, the ochre, oxblood, and teal of the South Texas land, and the history they carry into the fire.

A vintage glaze is a glaze drawn from a recipe older than the studio. Some come from the saturated middle of the last century; some from much earlier. They are slower, more particular, and more surprising than commercial glazes, which is the point: the glaze brings its own history and its own lively behavior to the firing, and the work accepts both.

Shelf detail in the studio: pieces drying, glaze jars beside the bench, the work in mid-process.

The Firing

The Fire

The fire gets a vote. Preparation matters, and so does acceptance. The firing makes the final argument.

Every piece passes through two low firings, once for the body and once for the glaze. By the time the door opens, the artist has already done what an artist can do. What comes out is a conversation between preparation and temperature. Shouganai. The work is what the work decided to be.

For Collectors

Studio Notes

A short reference for collectors and curators. Specifics are confirmed with the studio piece by piece.

Method
Hand-built. Walls raised from coils and slabs, joined and burnished by hand. Not thrown.
Body
Earthenware, built entirely by hand.
Firing
Low fire. Additional details are confirmed piece by piece on inquiry.
Glazes
Modern and vintage glazes, chosen for saturated color and lively surfaces.
Use
Decorative. Not for food use.

The Neighborhood

The Beacon Hill Studio

Beacon Hill is a neighborhood of quiet streets and long porches on the near-northwest side of San Antonio, a place built generations ago and lovingly kept by the city. The Studio sits near Woodlawn and Mulberry, and the whole neighborhood is welcome to come and find the work. Pieces leave the studio either through Mockingbird Handprints, a gallery in Olmos Park, or through inquiries to the studio itself.

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