Thoughts
Material (Sep 2024)
The other week I processed some clay from Mum and Dad’s garden. I soaked it and mixed it into a slip, roughly sieved it and dried it out. I wanted to see what it was like relatively unprocessed. The test piece fired to a dark red brown. I mixed the next batch with some of my regular clay to bring the melting temperature up a little.
I threw some coffee cups with it and somehow felt more relaxed than usual, like I was part of a collaboration. This clay brings its own character to the table, I bring mine and we meet in the middle. I like feeling a bit surprised at how something turns out.
At the moment I find myself drawn to pottery where the materials are obvious and it is so clearly from the earth. Allowing the natural world into my kitchen, my morning coffee, dinner with friends. At other times I’m drawn to work with precision and neatness, more clean than rough.
I suppose somewhere in the middle is where my work seems to lie. I sometimes feel pressure to find out what ‘my style’ of work is. But I don’t think it’s really about that. I think it’s more about following what I am interested in, leading with curiosity.
Idea, material, process.
I’ve been thinking about how the idea, materials and processes are the ingredients for an object. I want to make work that includes all of these. I usually start with a vague or precise idea, and then let the materials and the processes shape the outcome. Sometimes I try to stick too firmly to my idea and it doesn’t really work. Because the idea needs to be balanced with the other flavours.
It seems like the finished object/pot can’t be separated from its material, or from the processes, or from the person who made it and what they had in mind at the start. And the object/pot holds and says all of that if you listen.