Influences and the Carved Mugs
I do like the challenge in the making of a piece and this usually the initial driving force for my next project. This could by way of the size, technique, clay used, glaze look and feel and or, a combination of all these things. It’s a constant learning process, one that is never tiring and always thought provoking.
Pieces usually start as a wheel thrown vessel of some sort. There is something so satisfying to seemingly magically bring a lump of clay up into a pot. There’s an unrelenting eagerness then, to start the subtractions and additions. This, for me is where most of the magic either happens or not - as the case may be. Of course, I never really know until the piece comes out of the final firing and even then, sometimes if a piece passes the first test of being technically correct, I have leave it hidden away for a while to actually see the beauty … and, sometimes it ends up with a hammer through it and that’s fine too. Make notes and move on.
My mark making, colouring and carving has always been influenced by whatever is in my life at the point in time - the landscape, the sunrises, the sunsets, holidays at the beach and yes, the weather. The weather is tangible up on the ridge where my home studio is, and which is where most of the making happens these days. I vividly remember carving into some mugs during one of the rain seasons – I could hear the water rushing down the gully, through the grasses, making its own little waterfalls over rocks to the catchment below as I was carving. This carving out of the walls of mugs is still a constantly evolving theme at this point in time.
