By MARY MARGARET SIMS

Bernard Palissy was a French ceramicist and scientist in the 1500s. He was known for his rusticware, and was inspired by nature. He mostly made large oval platters with animals and vegetation on it. Palissy would design casts of dead animals and attach them onto his basins, ewers, and platters. He casted these precise clay animals because he was interested in close observation. He would then paint them natural colors with a shinny lead-based glaze on top to make it look more realistic. In the Oval Basin, Palissy used snakes, frogs, fish, lizards, crawfish, and shells to make his clay casts. He used a warm yellow orange glaze to make the animals pop and bring the whole piece together.