Getting Back to Work - WORK!!!!

Moving into my own house studio was so exciting while I was planning it, and doing  it.  Arranging everything in my small studio, getting the kiln hooked up, I was so excited.  Then, without very much pot making going on, I realized that somewhere in my psyche, I equated the new studio with "now I have to do it.  I have to produce and make money.  I have to go to work. WORK!!!!" (a nod, of course to Maynard G. Crebbs).

In a way, the summer is the best time for this to happen, because my 'season' if there is one, starts in the fall.  I can take a week or two to chill and think and do other thinks to support a business, like, finally getting my Etsy Shop in order. (help).  Then I'll have 2-3 solid months to create inventory for fall and 2-3 solid months to create my spring pieces. 

And this year I wanted to put a show together, "The Seder Plate: The Story of a People".  So, I have a plan, I have shows booked for the fall and spring.  So, what is my problem???? I think I miss the energy that comes from working with other artists.  Going to the Toe River Tour was so much fun and the work was inspiring and I miss not being in the RAD.  I don't miss Odyssey, but I miss the artists there and the support from others in the District.  Just venting, I guess.  I can't really stay away from the clay, it in my blood now.  Just another crossroad, I guess.  New work coming next week.

Ethics

This week has been an education in ethical considerations in conducting business, any business, really.  As usual, I turn to the teachings in the Torah and by our Rabbis.  The two dilemmas faced this week are both dealt with in the same Torah Portion, Vayikra 19:16 & 36. 

Last December, I purchased a kiln, furniture and a slab roller from my neighbor.   Without doing any real research, in my naivte (at 60 years of age, yet), I took the seller's word that the kiln was relatively new had been used very infrequently.  Now, in all fairness to the seller, he did say the kiln had been his ex-wife's and there is a chance that it was "new" to her, before she left him, and that she had used in "infrequently".  However, when the buttons on the controller stopped working, mid programming, after having fired it myself only four times, I called Skutt to find out the kiln was, in fact, circa 1997, and that it is probable that a new controller would be my best bet if the kiln body itself is still useable.  Vayikra (Leviticus) 19: 36 "Just balances, just weights, a just ephah, and a just hin, shall ye have", is an admonition to us to be fair with others while doing business.  We are to keep the scales by which we weigh the goods we sell balanced.  We are not to misrepresent the things we sell to others.

This is a nice segway into the second ethical dilemma of the week.  There was a tale told on Facebook by one artist about another artist (a student of the first) of the student "stealing" the techniques of the teacher and selling products as her own work.  This was done as a warning to other artists about mentoring students. My dilemma with reading this tale, was not the issues dealt with in line 36 of Vayikra, although they do bear discussion, but with Vaykra 19:16,  "Thou shalt not go up and down as a talebearer among thy people; neither shalt thou stand idly by the blood of thy neighbor".

Was it my duty, knowing both the student and the teacher to lodge a protest? Against the student? Or a protest against both the student and the teacher?


We are not to tell tales about another person whether true or not.  Telling tales is among the greatest sins of man against man, with making up tales being the most serious charge.  However, because some "truths" are relative, no tales are permitted.  AND, we cannot stand idly by while the others act unjustly against our neighbors.  Hmmm?


I chose to protest that manner in which the teacher presented the injustice to the world.  While I understand how she might have felt ripped off by the student, but that the teacher dealt with the student privately.  The student took the offending pieces off the market.  Why then did the teacher have to tell tales against the student, thereby embarrassing her and shaming her?  Could the story, without naming the student, have been enough of a warning to other artists? 

I'd be happy to hear how others feel about these issues. 

Making Pots

I think that every teenager in American should have to take pottery for at least one semester in Junior High or High School, like they have to have three semesters on French or Spanish.  The lessons learned from the highs and lows of the process will be immeasurably more valuable than being able to order a croissant at the local bakery or a Dos Equis in Tijuana during Spring Break.  It would also ensure that most customers would know the value of a pot that is hand thrown or built with loving care.

A previously posted list of the steps it takes to get just one pot made is in my blog list somewhere, but I only recall listing those steps that are taken when things go right.  It didn't talk about the thing that can go wrong, beginning with a customer wanting something for a holiday that is just 4 weeks away.  Can it be done? Well, yes, theoretically, if the potter is a production potter and makes 20-50 pots a day or more and can turn over multiple kiln loads in a short time, with assistants.  Most studio potters works on a much more spread out schedule, and depending on how they glaze fire, may only produce 4 very large kiln loads a year.

Then there is the possibility (read probability) that something happens to the kiln (like a burner going out), or in the kiln (like a pot with undetected air bubbles exploding leaving itself stuck in the glaze of all the other pots) or...????  The possibilities are staggering even in the best hands.

All I am saying is, be kind to your potter.  He/she loves the clay and the fire and the possibility that something he/she made will make you happy. 

Almost There

I have, for the last several months, been preparing, planning, organizing and realizing the dream of having my own studio.  I gave up my studio a Odyssey Studios & Gallery at the end of January, took a shelf there for a month during transition and have, except for one more bisque kiln and the possibility of taking classes there in future, left Odyssey, altogether.  I take with me valuable training by talented teachers and some new good friends.

I have not had time to organize the actual workspace, but I am working on actual orders from customers I've met at the various Jewish Festivals at which I have shown my work.  The task seemed daunting, until I was referred a UNCA ceramics grad who would very much like studio space in exchange for being my assistant.  And, this weekend, I am having the back patio covered and my Skutt KM-1227-3 installed.  Additional shelving and storage will be built in the coming weeks, so that, by May, I think I'll be ready to have a Clay Club meeting here.

So, if the "creek don't rise", and today it seems like it might, Oy Clay!!! Pottery and My Wonky Pots Studio are almost there.

HELP

Well, I've gotten myself in trouble again.  Kari very graciously agreed to help me fire Cone 10 in her kiln on the 24th and with all the moving and rain and , well, all of the excuses I can muster, I'll only have 1/2 a kiln. Is there anyone with pots to fill the kiln or a kiln with room for my pots next week.  I am desperate, as this is a big order (big for me) for Passover that has to be shipped by the end of the month.  Any advise?

Out of Bondage

Freedom is an interesting concept.  At the time of this writing, it seems the whole world is fighting for their concept of freedom.  Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, Wisconsin, Ohio, etal.  We are also learning scary lessons about  responsibility in exercising the freedom we think we have to "forge [earth's] beauty into power".  

As I write, Passover is a month away.  The iconic story of the Jewish people's delivery from bondage and the manner by which they became a "nation".  Many different struggles for freedom have taken the biblical story of freedom as their own symbol for their struggle.  But so often the ultimate lesson of the Exodus is lost in the glorification of the miracles, miracles that were meant to get the attention of a people whose destiny it is to learn and teach the lessons of the journey from slavery to freedom.   It needed a technicolor extravaganza just to ask humans to receive the lessons.  I hope the kind of explosion that is possible in our present situation is not necessary for us to learn the lesson of the role responsibility plays in the exercise of real freedom.

The Ten Days of Awe

For anyone who would like to know the Judaism I have come to embrace, listen to the conversation between Rabbi Sharon Brous and Krista Tippet.


The High Holy Days: A Conversation