“Sgraffito” comes from the Italian word meaning “to scratch.” And it fairly well sums up the process.
First you need something to scratch on.
Then you paint on some nice thick coats of underglaze, while its leather hard.
Then you scratch out a pattern. I have endless amounts of doodles to look at if I’m ever having trouble deciding exactly what I want to do. Then you bisque your pieces so the pattern is fired on.
Finally, add a layer of clear glaze and fire again and voila!
Getting my associates in fine art was one of the better decisions of my life. Not only did it prove to me that I can actually finish something (those damn flakey artist types!) but, and excuse my poor sentence structure, it opened up so many more processes for me. Apart from a few school projects from my childhood, I had never thought about ceramics. Never cared for it. But in the last year of school, I took a ceramics class and then another. And then I bought myself my own wheel. I was able to combine my love of illustration and pottery and create something that I found lovely to look and functional. People actually began to buy my work! I had finally found something creative to do, that was also lucrative.
The Artful Truth 