Becoming friends (again) with emptiness

"Thirty spokes are united around the hub to make a wheel, but it is the Non-being that the utility of the carriage depends. Doors and windows are cut to make a room, but it is on its non-being that the utility of the room depends. Clay is hollowed to make a mug, but it is its non-being that our beer depends." - Lao Tzu

Ugh. More lessons in emptiness (as the Buddhists call it), Non-being (as Taoists call it) and Ki (as Aikido masters' call it). Having studied Buddhist philosophy now for nearly a decade, I've read and heard countless teachings on the elusive concept of "emptiness." I try to think that I can understand this concept then something else reminds that I do not. I realize, with some pain, that I am VERY Western in my fixation on the object and the positive space; the concrete, tangible thing. I care about the Coca Cola in my cup, not that there is a space to hold my Coca Cola. That said...

Last night I was at an Aikido class. A 12 year old girl was in class. She was less than half the size of everyone in class, who were all large men. Feeling that her size was a disadvantage, she was somewhat discouraged to be paired with these men. She repeatedly applied techniques which were only modestly effective. After some discouragement, she exclaimed "I'm too small!" A master who was in the class stated, "Well, what do you expect, you took the adult class!" The teacher saw their exchange and focused on her. He lined up five men to attack her. She gasped in horror, but felt pressured to persevere. She followed through with her usual technique and barely caused a ripple in the 700 lbs of men pushing her. The teacher paused and drew an imaginary circle around the men, and the connection between their space and hers... He said: "Here's the Ki, it extends from your hands and fills this whole space. Do not focus on your arm movement or the weight of these men, push this empty space; blend with the Ki." Like some kind of defiance of physics, she did as he said, and with very little force she threw 700 lbs of men to the floor. I was shocked.


So today, I stop by the studio office to see my mentor to discuss the new direction she's been guiding me in (I discuss this in my post Black on white...). I shared with her the pieces in these pictures. She stated that she liked the direction I was going with surface technique, but that the pieces had no integrity-- that they were "lies." My cups are lies!!?? I was momentarily insulted, but I wanted to know where she was going with this line of thinking.

She proceeded to say that I was too focused on what I wanted the cup to look like, especially as it related to the shape. She asked me why I wanted throw on the "beastly wheel" when my better hand-building skills could serve me in what I wanted to accomplish aesthetically. I suddenly became emotional. I explained that I have no interest in what the clay of the cup looks like, but that I like to throw on the wheel. I like that it requires a kind of non-focus focus; that it's meditative and puts me in continuous reflection of my internal process. When I am not able to stay with the flow of clay and wheel, then everything goes wrong and I'm confronted with my psyche, my frustration (my own crap), and not with a cup. If I were in this hobby for aesthetic reasons, I would have stayed with photography, in which I have so much control and I wouldn't have changed careers to be a psychotherapist. This hobby, this life, is an inside job and so is creating.

After understanding me slightly better, she tried to explain what was going wrong (read: ill-weighted bottoms, inconsistency of wall thickness, poor trimming etc...) with the poor design of my cups (despite my basically good-enough skills at throwing). I was trying to understand, then she sharply told me: "You're not listening!!!" In some arrogance I think to myself, 'wait a minute, I'm a professional listener. I know how to do listening. So what the hell is she talking about?' Well, turns out she was right. I wasn't listening. Not because I wasn't trying, but I just couldn't HEAR or UNDERSTAND her -- as if she was speaking a foreign language. Finally she states clearly: you are not making a cup, you are creating an empty space, and it is the integrity of the empty space that is important, not the shape of the clay. She then quotes Lao Tzu... "from a lump of clay...It is the empty space within the vessel that makes it useful." I couldn't authentically listen to that because it's so foreign to my gestalt of how-do-I-get-the-next-surface to put my colors onto. On a deeper level, I had forgotten that I'm making cups. If the cup itself makes no sense as a container of empty space, then the surface design will just look awkward.

In the classic saying: wherever you go, there you are... I find myself again. Years of teaching on emptiness, a direct observation of it last night when a 12 year old girl threw down 5 men and now with my cups. I'm trying to become friends with this concept again. No matter how many times you fill, empty and refill a cup, the empty space within the cup is used but not used up. It is always available.

White on Black, or Black on White

I'm finally moving toward something more cohesive that uses all the skills I'm pulling together in the studio. It's been a big learning curve of throwing, firing, glazing and decaling. My biggest dilemma lately has been using the richness of black clay in contrast with white. I'm absolutely in love with Cassius Basaltic. It's a temperamental mid-fire clay with manganese which makes it really black. Unfortunately, I'm finding it difficult to dial in the bisque firing so that it doesn't bloat in the final firing at cone 5. I can fire it to cone 4 without bloating, but the clay loses it's sheen and it's blackness and the mid fire Cone 5 commercial glazes don't respond well to this lower temperature. Also, most of my glazes have issues with craters, pinholing on this clay. So to get a very glossy white is a slow process, but my current idea is to stick with a thicker layer of underglaze, and to use a clear glaze that becomes molten at a lower temperature. All that said, I am getting closer to what I want...

This cup still has problems, but it is much closer to my final goal with this work. It is Cassius, wheel thrown, white velvet underglaze, zinc free glaze, fired to Cone 4. The commercial rose decal was fired in a 3rd firing to cone 016.



This cup was made same as above, however after wheel thrown I hand shaped it.


This is a strange little egg vase, which was fired to Cone 5. Some minimal bloating. The glaze on it is commercial Cone 5 Temmoku which gives it s nice black quality. Clear glaze on Cassius softens the color to a lighter brown so I use Temmoku.


Here is a photo I've included to show the difference between Cone 4 and Cone 5 firing of Cassius. The cup closest to the front is fired at the lower temperature. The cup further back, is shinier (that is the natural clay without glaze) and more black. However, there is obvious bloating (the small bumps).


Lastly, I may have a new approach to my final aesthetic goal that also may be safer to make. Sometimes I get paranoid about manganese absorption while throwing Cassius. There's a lot of debate about it. One of my instructors who's been working in pottery over 40 years says that I just shouldn't eat it and I'll be fine. But, she has also suggested an alternative approach that will allow more flexibility in my aesthetic goals, with closely the same results and completely vitreous. Rather than use Cassius, I'm experimenting with a Cone 10 porcelain and a Cone 10 black slip that includes some manganese and cobalt oxide.

Here are some examples of these new test runs. This is unfired greenware of Babu Cone 10 porcelain with a black clay slip. I'll have more glaze quality control on the whites and be able to easily add decaling. I think her suggestion may be the answer for me. But I still will not give up on Cassius.

Studio Seconds: Uglies, Errors, Oddities and Strangeness

These are the dregs of the studio that would usually never hit the photographer's lens. They are all being used as a tool holders, will head off to the Good Will and the less fortunate pieces that have lost their utility (due to glaze defects) will hit the trashcan once they've been documented here. Today I bring you these pieces as a tribute to all the Regretsys of the world, all the lost souls and garage sale relics.

Trust me, these look better in the photo studio than in person-- some of them can barely be held because they are so heavy and poorly designed. Some had a lot of potential, but glaze defects ruined them. As I discussed in my Pete Hornberger post, I have no real style yet. I'm just learning techniques, which is especially apparent in studio seconds. Eventually there will be a cohesive application of all these techniques...

Cone 10 Nara Porcelain. Part of my 100 cup assignment (just learning to throw on the wheel).



Cone 10 Nara Porcelain. Part of my 100 cup assignment. Such a tragic cup in weight, design and balance-- thought I could save it with a unicorn and stars. No luck. ha! It has a funny charm, though.


Cone 5. Hagi Porcelain. This cup has better weight and balance, but the majority of the underglaze sunset burned off in the kiln and the glaze is severely pitted.


Cone 04 White Star slip cast tea bowl. The decal was applied to cover up other decorative defects, and it didn't work. Some glaze defects in the interior.


Cone 10 Nara Porcelain. Part of my 100 cups assignment. What can I say, I was just learning to throw and this cup is sooo heavy and imbalanced that you can use it as a doorstop. I added the gold hydrangeas to give it a little bit of charm.


Cone 04 White star slip cast. This was a decal and glaze experiment, with less than stellar results. The other side has an iron decal hot dog on it that is half burned off. The blue decals are overfired and faded, but it's still functional.


Cone 04 white star slip cast. This was a studio tragedy. This piece went through 4 separate firings. It was perfect. No decal defects, no glaze defects. Just perfect. I was walking through the studio and tripped. It flew out of my hand and you can see the results-- cracked. I use it for paint brushes now.


Cone 04 white star slip cast from styrofoam cup. This was just a test. The glaze does not fit clay body and I was learning to apply decals and the decal on the other side burned right off.


Cone 5 Hagi Porcelain with Laguna glazes. This black cup was the 2nd or 3rd object that I've ever thrown on the wheel. The bottom is untrimmed, but somehow the whole thing kinda works. I love the glaze drip at the bottom-- a moment in time frozen. It's a really heavy cup.


Cone 10 Nara Porcelain with an orange shino glaze. Part of my 100 cups assignment.


Cone 5 Hagi Porcelain. I like this cup and it is representative of a direction my work is going, but the glaze pitting has rendered it useless.

Decal Work & Statement Cups

Cone 04 White Star slip cast. 2 firings (bisque & glaze, iron decals are applied to greenware). I made this "lucky" mug for my husband's moments of reflection with his morning coffee. The quote is an Oblique Strategy by Brian Eno (my hubby's inspiration). The inside is glazed orange and there is a decal of a lucky rabbit's foot.




Cone 04 Steve's White. Wheel thrown. 3 firings. This is from my pin-up cups series (I have several more, which unfortunately I don't have photos of).


Cone 04 White Star slip cast. 3 firings. From my monster cup series. I custom made this for a friend.






Cone 04 White Star slip cast. 4 firings, including lustre firing for gold.




Cone 04 White Star slip cast. 3 firings. Iron decals were applied to bisque which gives them a more faded feeling.




Cone 04 White Star slip cast. 3 firings. I made these two espresso cups (from my monster series) for film composer, Cliff Martinez to celebrate his amazing work on the film, Drive. The cup below them is Cone 04 White Star slip cast. 2 firings. I made this cup for my favorite holiday, Halloween! There is a carved spider web on the other side. The indentation in the lip of the cup is a teaspoon nook.

Work - Jan 2011