New Horizons

As the sun rises I awake to the sound of swallows on the windowsill and the river flowing behind the apartment, and increasingly when I wake I greet the day with the thought that today is going to be a day to create. A day to play. Another day to dream more. I am getting closer and closer to the genesis of my love for pottery. It is one of the few areas I have found where I am actually able to directly (at times at least) translate my dreams into physical being. Sometimes those dreams are spawned from seeing other potter's work, sometimes from nature, and sometimes from the clay itself as it spins on the wheel. My enthusiasm for pots has only been on the incline since I last wrote my friends.

Now, I know that was a long time ago, and I am sorry for abandoning you a bit. You see, I created a Facebook business page for A. Sartorius Ceramics, and the benefits and progress of continuing to post there are far and away more measurable and read than my continued posting on Blogger has been. This could be, and probably is, user error to some degree. However I have a new resolution to do my very best to post once a week here. I like having the ability to go more into the details of what I am reading about, listening to, and thinking about my making process. So I think we'll dub Thursday the day for thoughts and thinkings on all things throwing and pottery related.

In the time between our last conversation I've stumbled upon a few really great things for all those creatively minded with a pension for pots. The Tales of a Red Clay Rambler  is a weekly podcast put out by Ben Carter who is fantastic potter. Ben is doing some really incredible stuff and is very vocal about potters being culture makers. His interviews with other potters talk about everything from the state of the contemporary market to artist's inspirations and creative movements. I look forward to the new podcast each week, and you should check it out!

May was a busy month for me, with two really fantastic shows. The first was an event in Matsuyama, Ehime at the Sen Guesthouse. Live music by three of my very good friends from Kochi, and the guest house owners mixed up some delightful specialty cocktails for the event. Loads of great people came bye.

Towards the end of the month I participated in a group show at the Quard Market in Ino. This event was WAY busier than I was ready for, and was an absolute blast to go to. A day of local artists, food vendors, and musicians all coming together. There were tons of people. Great times all around.

Like I said I am going to make a concerted effort to bring this blog back into the light of day once a week. There's always more to talk about, and pots to be made! Hopefully I can revamp the blog a bit and get it up to the same level as the A. Sartorius Ceramics facebook page (which you should definitely go check out), and while you're there you should go ahead and pop on over to my brand spanking new Etsy shop! It's just getting off the ground, and I'm a total beginner at managing all this digital media, but it's the way of the future! And that future, it's coming our way. See you next Thursday!

Photo Journal: The Dragon

Pots out back of Thow Kwang Pottery Center

The baby dragon. 

One of Singapore's last 2 dragon kilns. This thing was massive! 

Inside the dragon. 

So back in the holiday season Stephanie and I went to Singapore, and I may have mentioned that we adventured our way to one of Singapore's last giant climbing dragon kilns. When we got to the slightly out of the way location it was starting to rain, we were being devoured by mosquitoes, and it turned out that there were no classes being offered that day. So. . . resigned to only getting to look at a kiln without really getting a chance to learn much about it we explored the large open air studio. A whole lot of the work sold at this pottery center isn't had made in Singapore, but we managed to find one of the artists in residency at Thow Kwang Pottery, Steven Low. And he saved our day of pottery center exploration. Steven talked to us about the ceramics community that had grown around these dragon kilns, and about his time as care taker for the kiln. He also talked with us a little about his new lines of work. His kindness and personal attention to two wayward travelers interested in a bit of pottery was incredibly generous. Thank you Steven! If you are ever in Singapore and want to have a guaranteed great time GO VISIT STEVEN! The dragon kiln is a stunning sight, and the work that comes out of it is equally stunning.

Steven with some of his work in progress. 

I love his tea bowls. 

Steven loves making tea bowls, and has a huge collection of beautiful creations at the pottery center. This little beauty was irresistible, and is now happily siting in my apartment.  

Steven's studio. 

New Year / New Pots

Happiest of 2014's to you all. It's a balmy, grey, 10 (C) degrees today, and I'm none to envious of the reports from America of temperatures hovering down far closer to zero (F)  than Kochi will ever get. I have so much to tell after a six day trip to Singapore and the issuing in of a new year, but I'll save all that for a post all of it's own. 

I've been able to sneak back into the studio since returning to school, though not near as much as I would like. In the time given I've been cranking out forms to be carved after they get to leather hard. Mostly slab work but they're a blast to crank out. I miss the wheel and can't wait to have a biger block of time to devot to it at work.  



Look at those lovely rows of comerical cups! Meet some new inspiration : the Kopi coffee cup. But! That looks like a regular cup and saucer. You might be thinking. In Singapore drink stands are called kopi tiam, and there is a lovely little history to these style of cups. The suacers are deeper than their more conventional cousins, and I just absolutely love both the coffee (sweetend with condensed milk) and the form of these little mugs. Hopefully I'll have time soon to try my hand at them, but figured the first post of the new year should include at least one goal for the comming year. 

Speaking of the new year i have a host of resolutions and hopes for 2014, a good deal of which deal entirely with pottery. On our way home from Singapore Steph and I stopped in Kyoto to aquire some good luck for the comming year.  

Nothing fills the heart with better feelings for the comming year's potential like macha, a delightful little sweet, and the best company I could ask for - all enjoyed in the outer guardens of Kinkakujin (the Golden Pavilion). It's going to be a wonderful year. I hope your Holidays were magical and your already doing well with your own resolutions.  

Tobe: the Real Deal

Two weeks ago Stephanie and I took her friend Sarah to Tobe Yaki. Tobe, like Bizen, is a traditional Japanese pottery center. Tobe's style couldn't be more different than the dark reds, bronzes, and gold browns of Bizen's climbing kilns, but the feel is largely the same. Almost every home has some little ceramic detail, and every garage, livingroom, or back yard has some type pottery studio, collection of slip molds, or even a small kiln shed in the back yard. IT WAS GLORIOUS to see.

Simply the idea of an artistic community dedicated to preserving, promoting, and simutaniously modernizing local pottery traditions is like stepping into my dream list of job titles and making them materialize before my eyes. The Tobe Culture Center has a fantastic show room that takes you through the early traditions of the pottery, and also showcases the way the various artists and families of potters have changed the traditional forms and had fun with the glazes. Tobe is most well known for its navey blue brush work on white clay, but as you can see there are many takes on this old standard.

We got a chance to try our hand at painting a pot of our choosing. My brushwork clearly needs work, but I think Steph is a natural! It was great fun, and I'd return in a heart beat to show just about anyone this little treasure of ceramic culture.

Here are a few of the more contemporary designes we saw at the cultural center. There was a huge (very cool) store where you could buy work, but photos were prohibited.

I have some peices in a local christmas market in Kochi City. If you're in Japan and have just been itching for one of my pots then this would be a good chance. Yamma Neko gallery is a great place.

Mr. Leach even made time to stop in. It's always such a pleasure to see his work.

All this typing about pottery has me itching to get into the studio and get back into the making cycle. I saw some really fantastic slab work in Tobe and have been thinking about trying my hand at it since. I'm off to create something, you should do the same!

Dream Walks and Fixed Kilns

Step by step in the quiet rain I head for temples hidden amoungst the hustle of one of Shikoku's biggest cities. Two weeks ago Steph and I checked off Matsuyama from our 88 temple trek. Along the way we stayed at the always fantastic Sen Guesthouse (seriously if you travel through Matsuyama do yourself a favor and stay there!). While there, I got to conversing with the owner about local potters. Matsuyama is home to Tobe Yaki, a place which I am sadly very under educated at the moment. The work that I associate with Tobe Yaki (as I knew it) is traditionaly a white clay body with blue designs painted under a clear glossy glaze. The owners at the Sen guest house assured me that that may be the traditional imagery, but that there is some really creative and absolutely fantastic contemporary ceramics comming out of Tobe.  

 This is a pot from Asato Ikeda, and I am absolutely in love with his forms. They're loaded with motion and energy. Appearantly the folks and Sen Guesthouse are friends of his and work to help him publisize his ceramics from time to time. I'd love to pic this guys brain, and watch his process for creating such movement within the clay. 

As some of you may know my other obsession in life is tiny houses, and I saw this little beauty cruzing down the road on the way to the Kochi Air Port for a business trip to Tokyo. Similarly to my desire to pic the brains of Tobe's youthful potters I would LOVE to spend an afternoon exploring the construction of this little movable cabin. I doubt it is used for camping or dwelling. It is owned by a bakery, but I am willing to bet it could be repurposed to be dweld within. If you asked me why I love tiny houses I don't think I could adiquately articulate my feelings in a clear enough mannor. The biggest appeal of them is that they seem doable! I have always wanted to build my own home, but have absolutely no knowledge of carpentry, construction, and only the very basest of handymanery. Constructing something tiny is a way to get around the daunting challenge of learning all of that full scale. They are also significantly easier to heat, own, make energy efficient, and leave less of an imprint on the world that surrounds us. I could go on for days about hwo freak'n cool tiny structers are and how much I want to make pottery in one, but I won't . . . because that isn't what you're here for.

You're here because you're my friend, and you are curious about my ceramics and life. Now we come to the news that you and I have been waiting for, for weeks and weeks. The kiln repair is complete! There is a bisque firing happening as we speak and Yamatogi Sensei assures me that I can do a glaze firing this weekend if all goes well. Extatic does not do my feelings justice. I have a load of my own work (mostly ochoko and a few tea bowls) to fire, and probably at least a load of tiles from the workshop I did last month during my exhibition.

Thanks for reading! If you get a chance go check out Asato's work. Keep creating.

Return

After a long trip home, the first in 2 years, I'm back in Susaki and in the studio. There is a lot of work to be done before the opening of my show on September 13th. I've been granted space in the Machikado Gallery to display my work. I've never put together a show before, esspecially a solo exhibition, so my thoughts about the best ways to display everything and all the other ins and outs are really racing.

I have always loved texture and surface decorations. They alter the tone and give the eye a reason to pull the hands to the peice. This show's collection is largely going to e peices that focus on texture and giving a sense of agedness to something new, and also atempting to replicate the natural element of an atmospheric firing in my electric kiln with only factory made glazes and changes to the temperature and exposure of the firing cycle. Just come and have a look!

Home was wonderful, as home should be! The whole family came out in force to welcome me back. We soaked eachother in for two weeks, and I even managed to see some of my oldest and dearest friends from both high school and the good old Wooster days. There will be more info and news to come along with more photos of new work, but for now the sauna of a studio is calling to me. Thanks for reading! It's good to be back.

GO HERE! GO GO GO!

Two and a half hours north of Kochi City and then a short train ride to the east is a place where stacks upon stacks of cut and dried pine litter the streets. A place where back alleis were cobbled with the old broken bits of pottery deemed unfit for sale. Where every storefront, every window has vestles painted with flame and ash, and ever third home sprouts a 5 story chimney from a kiln shed that's taken root just behind a home. They've been digging and firing clay from the green hilsides here since the Heian period (794). The peices unearthed from the large anagama kilns are known for their red and brown shades. This little slice of pottery nerd heaven is called Bizen, and it's Japan's oldest midevil pottery town.  

Last weekend I went with Steph and a fellow pottery enthusiast named Mitch to visit this mythical place of pottery power. Due to time constraints we were only able to spend one day exporing this little hot bed of ceramics goodness, but it left a lasting impresion on me. Every corner, every wall, every store front, and even the local temple were covered in tiny hand made ceramics details.

A ceramic face  peeks out from  an overgrown wall.

The wall to the local shrine had a tile from every potter that lived in the town.

One of the many many kilns we saw just awaiting use in someone's back yard.

To walk through these streets, see the galleries (esspecially the huge one in the train station), and just be surounded by a place absolutely soaked in ceramics was such a wonderful expereince. I day dreamed as we walked, talking about the endless potential for growth I saw in a place like this, so much so that I had to be reminded of the endless potential for growth I have at my finger tips here in the ceramics studio in susaki.

Oh those Bizen colors.

We even managed to get a small hand building lesson.

I've read that it's very difficult to study in Bizen, and truly I am a full time teacher who only has time for a hobby in ceramics at the moment, but a boy's got to dream doesn't he! Our exploratiosn of the pottery center left me hungry for more, and itching to get back in the studio. I managed to sneak in enough time yesterday to build several lovely little bowls, and have plans to dash down just now and squeeze in another hour or so. Go out and find your equivilent of a pottery village! Persue what speaks to you in any way possible, and get hungry for it. little trips like last weekends help remind me why I've such a hunger for ceramics!

Thanks for reading! See you again soon.

Trips and Travels

 Happy new year dear readers! Above are a sampling of works that came out of the kiln before the Christmas Holidays came knocking at my door step. The blue and green cup pictured above are actually not my work. These fine yunomi were created by a friend, Mark, who asked for
my assistance with a gift for his fiance. The three cups show in the bottom left now dwell in
the Gray family home, where I hope they are used every day!

I've been been bad to you. Neglectful even! In part my absence of postings has been because of a two week travel explosion to Vietnam where I traveled by plane, taxi, bus, van, big boat, little boat, train, and my own two feet to Hanoi, Sapa, Ha Long Bay, Ho Chi Minh, and The Mekong Delta. It was a holiday season to be remembered by its vast difference from any other experience I've had. Vietnam was an almost completely sensory experience (at times borderline overload). The colors, smells, sights,
and taste were all challenging, vivid, and mostly delectable. I even managed to squeeze in a small traditional pottery exhibit while I was traveling, but I can't say the small selection I saw really sparked
my fancy.

The year to come will be full of many great and grand adventures, and I have so many hopes for the growth of my work. Because my life seems to be a bit busier than before, and because I don't want to promise more than I can deliver I am going to shift from promising two posts every week to one post for now. If the new year proves to be less busy than the tail end of 2012 then I'll return to two a week, but for now we'll go for one more meaningful post.

I hope you all had a wonderful holiday season! Go out and create something in the new year. Can't wait to get back in the studio!