I have been reading a lot and thinking a lot about making and what it means to make in the post industrial age when everything is mass produced at a fraction of the cost. Ashamed as I am to admit it my every day plates and bowls are from Tescos and Ikea. I can't afford nice hand made ceramics, just like every body else.
I find it hard to define what I do, I make non-functional ceramics that falls in a grey area between design art and studio pottery. A no mans land. The desire to make is integral to who I am, my brother is a carpenter, my mum knits, crochets and paints, my dad was a mechanic, my grandad another carpenter. Its in my blood. Its an urge, and I don't feel right if I don't have an outlet, if I don't make.
Check out this article by Edmund De Waal http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/8f50d924-4b63-11e0-89d8-00144feab49a.html#axzz1kJtcqp7Z. Here De Waal articulates in words far better than I could ever muster the innate need to make. This is a question I am becoming increasingly obsessed with. Why did I think it would be a good idea to give up a full time job and go part time so that I can dedicate 2 days a week to making pots which at the moment are stacking up in the garage while I wait to get the kiln wired in. I don't have buyers, or a show coming up, I just feel as though I have to make.
What about the 'Power of Making' exhibition currently on at the V&A http://www.vam.ac.uk/content/articles/p/powerofmaking/ Clearly I am not alone. There are hundreds and thousands of makers out there. But what is our future? Are we evolving out, are we now a niche exclusive market only for the people who really feel the need to make and handle objects that are made.
Emmanuel Cooper Died on the weekend. The other week I was in the CPA shop opposite the British Museum http://www.cpaceramics.com/ holding a pot by Cooper. His hands held the pot and formed it and now he is gone. His pots will live on, with his finger marks and the traces of every decision he made while making each piece preserved. You can't get that from a Ikea mug. Across the road in the BM a Cycladic nipple pot, which has to be my favourite thing in the whole museum 1800-1550 BC. With every little mark left by that maker intact thousands of years later.
I guess I am trying to justify what I do, find a valid reason. Is just wanting to make enough?
7 comments:
It most certainly is Anne..great post thanks !
I agree with Adriana, go with it, your work is beautiful.
Thank you for the encouragement, I spend a lot of time thinking about the direction Ceramics is going in. I see your in Australia, in the UK we have many courses shutting down and it appears that the popularity of ceramics is dwindling, is it the same for you guys?
Thank you Adriana, that is the most response I have had to any post I have written! I tried not to be self conscious, and to write a truthfully as possible about my thoughts relating to ceramics, it does concern me the way the popularity of ceramics in Education is decreasing in the UK. I am worried for the future and wonder if it is possible to carve out a new theoretical space which is more relevant to the contemporary age.
Hello Anne! I found this post through Adriana. I agree too, it is enough, even if it seems silly sometimes.
I'm only starting out as a young potter and I feel crazy doing it, but I LOVE it and it makes me happy. And I can see how people do appreciate handmade and it makes THEM happy too. Sure, it's a tiny amount of people, but they give me hope.
I wish every bit of luck to you.
Katy.
I guess the loving it and it making us happy is the big part that drives all of us. I hope in this blog and through my work to explore that meaning and relevance of making to humans. After all isn't using tools what marked us out as different many moons ago (like in 2001 Space Odyssey in the moment when they first pick up the tools). I am sure loosing it would mean loosing a fundamental part of what it means to be human. I am not denying change or the technological revolution, I embrace all that stuff, howeve e shouldn't neglect other parts of the human psyche.
Am I totally mad??
you say you can't afford nice pots for your own kitchen, yet you make pots. why not make your own dinnerware?
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