Dave and Boni Deal

Dave and Boni Deal have created raku ceramics for over 30 years, working full time at their rustic home studio in the Cascade Mountains of the Pacific Northwest. The Deal's have focused on large classical forms which Dave throws on a potter's kick-wheel. Boni, his wife and collaborator, uses her talent for design to help decorate and glaze the forms before the raku firing. The work is highly textured with drawings and impressed leaves from the wilderness which surrounds them. Both cite a love and "awe of the natural world" as inspiration for their work.

Dave performs the dramatic raku firing often by grabbing the large pots by hand from the hot kiln, and then immediately smothering them with combustible materials, which ignite and cause reduction and carbon trapping in the clay. The finished pots highlight the best qualities of American Raku, featuring bright copper colored blushes, transitioning into blues, purple, and mottled black. These beautiful and unique creations have been shown nationally in prominent galleries and have won numerous awards.