I spent some time in the clay studio today. Just me and what remains of my bag of clay (went and bought myself another, even). I've been trimming pots all week (OK, this is hard when everything is awkward and slightly off center) and glazing and today I tried my hand at pinch pots and slabrolling and coil construction and slipping and scoring.

The newness of clay for me is a such a fun thing. I wonder how as we grow conditioned to one set of ways of working (I draw, I paint, I write, that's what I do) we close off others. It took me a good half a year of watching the potters and noticing that the ceramics studio always draws someone to quietly, carefully work the wet mud, before I signed up for my beginners class. My teacher told me I was 'cleared' for intermediate next go-round if I want it. And I think I do. My cylinders are getting taller and that slipping and scoring seems quite promising.

I slip.
I score.
I will return to the site of my last adventures. Yep, in less than a short week I'll spend a long week in Atlanta where my husband and I lived for many years up until last July. We skipped town for a laundry list of reasons, not least of which was that the pace felt wrong, we couldn't save a dime and we missed our families. Of course, we'd formed new families through a network of friends and the live fast, spend freely life is fun for a vacation. I've custom fit my vacation, actually. It's work, it's play, catch-up, nostalgia and new adventure. I'll teach, I'll treat my friends to stories of our new life up north and I plan to draw again. Maybe I'll finally check out Mudfire or spend a big chunk of time watching my great friends great kids run around like they have no worries. It's sunny and seventy. What's to worry about?

For those of you in Atlanta, news will follow shortly about a fabulous art party and for those of you about to rock, well, I salute you.

Sorry. I slip. I lose points.
Ok, take care,
Rachael

I'm hooked on this pottery thing. Today I learned how to glaze a bit and got a huge kick out of the mystery of which color would appear when the pieces come out of the kiln. I won't know for a week or two. I dipped my pots into vats of color (yellow-green, blue, maroon, clear, you name it) and then let the glaze dry and dipped again. Glazing will be about trusting the bit of knowledge I gleaned from the test tiles and from asking other folks in the studio ("should the clear be so thick?") and my own gut instincts about color (my hopes are high for the red-green) and learning from the results.


Come to think of it, that's much what painting is (or writing). The more sketchbooks I filled as a teen, then an art student, then a student, then a temp, then a you-name-it...the more I felt confident to draw, sketch, doodle, write and otherwise catch ideas in a net that is a small book brought with me daily. Somedays the images in the book are about looking (like those Oxalis) and somedays they are about processing experience.



I was talking to a stranger on the phone the other day and I suggested she try something simple, she sighed heavily and said "I'm so stressed!". I found a plan B for her and realized that the whole time, my calm and my strategy was helped by the little circles I drew on an index card. On a day of high stress for me I make messy pages in my book like the one below. Sure I might feel like I have to be all things to all people but then I can go glaze and be the beginner potter, the master dripper and spiller (yeah right) and the goofball giggling in the studio when the pot falls out of the tongs, drops to the bottom and has to be fished out.
Making art or making messes or making messes on the path and in the hope of making art may not be the path for all people, I would be willing to admit that. But it works for me. At least today.


Take care,

Rachael

OK, before I forget to respond to all the blog comments and emails and questions I'll sit here listening to the hum of the drier and report.

That Vitaly Komar talk the other night was really an eye opener. I had seen his work (promarily the collaborations with Alex Melamid as Komar and Melamid) for years (mostly in slide talks and art magazines and in bits and spurts.) It was slick, it was clever (buying souls, creating imaginary Russian artists, surveying America about her favorite and least favorite artworks). Really, I sat there laughing and scribbling and filling in the gaps on projects I'd heard of but really didn't know.
Hearing Vitaly Komar and Billy Collins in the same week, left me thinking about the people (mostly men I realize) I know who use humor as a way of working in the world, and thinking about how for every calm and casual, laughing and relaxed character there is usually a counterpoint: a worrywart, a nervous person, someone not so laughing, not so relaxed, and not so free. Komar said something really interesting near the end of his talk, as he showed his most personal, most vunerable drawings and collages (which weave his memories of his family with his spiritual belief and hopes for humanity). It's heavy stuff in these images but beautiful. Only not funny. As when Billy Collins is not funny. Or when William Wegman is not funny. Or when Saul Steinberg is not funny.

Because they are often so funny, the un-funny stings, resonates, and causes me to stop and think.

Also in the comments here lately, I've found an old friend (rather she's found me, hello Renee!) and been asked about the teen art camps I teach every summer. I'm headed back to Atlanta in a few weeks to teach another one and frankly the idea of drawing everyday with adolescents is a big kick. They are honest, obsessed, eager, hardworking, fascinated, and ready to try something new. It's funny (yeesh, I'm there again) how much I like that work.
It's cold here in upstate New York but my friend Deb sent me the info on this show in Buffalo she's included in. I'm entranced by the web images and the idea of an artshow in a conservatory. All of these images seem cold and warm to me. So very Buffalo. More art shows in non-art places, please! Anywhere, everywhere, not always, but often.
Take care,
Rachael

I left out about 6 dozen paintings I love from my list the other day. It's a game I'm not so good at. I'm much more interested in drawing and listening (Collins, Komar, and a bunch of other interesting folks this week) and working on that wheel nowadays.
Although this town practically reeks of lilacs, I'm still fascinated by Oxalis. Here's another page from the sketchbook.

Take care, Rachael

Talked tonight and showed his work. I'm thinking about it still and intrigued by the big bang work and his hopes for a Three Day Weekend. Those Russian artists are dreamers. It's inspiring how artists might try to tell their own stories through imagery that connects a bigger world. I have notes from this lecture, too, but am simply too tired to excerpt 'em or scan 'em or do anything but slip into a big sleep.
goodnight, Rachael