Merrie Boerner on sat 9 sep 00
I enjoyed your post....as well as Vince's.....I was cleaning off my desk
today and ran across a card which says,
" Those Who Hear Not The Music
Think The Dancers Mad."
This applies to most potters who have forfeited our hands, nails, forearmes,
elbows, lungs, social lives, etc..... in our quest to make the pot that
satisfies. My friends just don't understand me,.....but they envy my
passion.
I, too, was recently required to write an "artist statement" and struggled
over it for months. I finally wrote one about why I choose to fire with
wood. I just could not write about my pottery, except that I strive to make
pots worthy of the wood firing endeavor.... Eventhough I have worked in
clay for 15 years, I still evolve.....grow....learn.....I have made many
pots as the music and extreme pleasure took over and "thought" could not
even be recalled the next day. Maybe they were not great pots...but very
satisfying work !
Recently I was required to introduce myself to our small town arts
council. After about 20 people before me had given crudentials a yard
long.......I simply stated, "I'm Merrie Boerner, I make pottery." there was
a long pause, so I added, "THEREFORE I AM !" The whole room
laughed...Merrie makes big funny....but the MOST important thing to me is
that I like the pots that I made today more than the pots I made last
week.....some people will never understand the dance.....but they DO envy it
!
Glad to be back on CLAYART after a Summer of vacation !
Merrie in Mississippi
Jeanette wrote...
All art is communication on some level.
Just as dance is communication through gesture
and music speaks to the emotions,
visual art is a language heard directly by the psyche.
It is instantly understood by every human being.
Each viewer gets it on a different level,
depending upon their own unique experience.
It is a fundamental dialog,
much like the milli-second between thought and speech:
More felt, than put into words.
I have been fortunate in my life
to have lived in many parts of the world -
the Orient, Middle East, Western Pacific and Europe.
All of their influences affect my work
through an interplay of design, technique and form.
I am continually intrigued with the challenge of creating
through the clay medium.
I love engineering clay.
But clay is more than this.
It is a physical challenge as well as a mental one.
That's what makes it so engaging.
It is important for me
to work in a studio flooded with music,
helping me reach a level of harmony of mind and body
to find that essence of expression--
so unique and sometimes so hard to attain--
that goes beyond words,
beyond conscious thought
into that extraordinary, intuitive landscape
where time stops and all that exists
is the power of the process.
Jeanette Manchester Harris
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