Paula Moros on thu 10 may 01
enthusiasm
-sorry if this comes late after initial thread- mis-posted yesterday and did
not get throught to list- - -
I don't suppse this is a comfort, but in any case my feeling is that here in
New Zealand we're seeing the same move from institutions away from clay and
into glass - particularly cast. Universities here are distancing them selves
from craft degrees altogether and replacing them with more generic design
degrees. Glass 'sits' with design and design theory somehow easier in an
institutional context. Not sure why.
I'm going to a sale this saturday at Artstation, (a very reputable
inner-city, council run institution) because they're selling off all their
pottery and loom weaving equipment and getting totally into cast glass. In
the literature from Artstation I noticed that Craft Glass Artist is a name
worthy of a string of capital letters, or in other words a very serious and
contemporary kind of art worker. I think art administrators are reading
glass as 'modern' in a way they're not prepared to read pottery now - my
guess is something to do with captured light, cleanliness and transparency.
The whole not-the-dirt-ness of it.
but far from seeing the 'writing on the wall' for pottery as a source of
income or career path I've reduced by a quarter my hours of paid office
work, bought a Leach kickwheel and gone mad for shino glazes made with just
two ingredients to slap on my chunky 70's style platters that I churn out
with abandon at the local (and very fantastic) studio potters centre.
Potting just makes me stupidly happy and messy takes alot of my limited
money but i'd rather be the person I get to be at the pottery centre than
any other. To make matters worse my partner is getting into weaving art
pieces on the loom, another craft practice not currently flavour of the
month with institutions / buyers / dealers / people in general.
I've seen some beautiful, poetic cast glass recently but iI doubt i'll ever
make any of it, its just not my medium. I'd hate to think that i've chosen
pottery making out of some tragic and quasi-romantic need to be poor and
unapprieciated the rest of my life, but in the past year or two i've turned
from seeing pottery as something I could do full-time for money to something
i'll spend nights stocking supermarket shelves to pay for. If I won the
lottery i'd just spend it all on clay things because i'm in the foolish
happy enthusiasm place. anyways enough rambling on..hope you have a lovely
potting day.
Paula Moros
Auckland, N.Z.
PMoros@ahsl.co.nz
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