ceramics monthly, suck factor, dream interpretation anyone?

updated thu 3 aug 06

primalmommy on tue 1 aug 06

I have to say I thoroughly enjoyed the last issue of CM. (Trapped inside
with the AC, in these last weeks of summer, I have been drinking gallons
of sun-tea and doing more reading than usual.)

I have heard people describe CM as a little "stuffy" -- but between Tony
Clennell's hands-on, useful theories and the guy who charted his
lifetime or pots in "suck factor units", I thought this last issue had
kind of rolled up its sleeves. I am liking the themes every month, too.

I keep thinking about the "suck factor" graph -- in particular, because
his chart peaked in grad school -- due, he says, to the pressures and
influences. I sure hope I am not investing this kind of time and money
in grad school to make worse pots than I do already!

Maybe it's because when you try a million new things, a large percentage
of them are going to be failed experiments? Maybe grad school will push
me out of my comfort zone, so I'll try what's new instead of what I know
I can make well?

Or maybe if I pump up my ego enough in school, I will decide anything I
do is brilliant, and only later will recognize the truth. I have a tiny
tea set with faces in the area Salon de Refuse show and spent a lot of
time at the opening puzzling over some of the "art"... as I suspect some
folks scratched their heads over mine.

I guess time will tell.

Suck factor might be hard to chart, too, because of "forgiveness
variable". I find that if enough time goes by, I forget what I had
expected the pot to be, and can judge it based on its own qualities
instead of its failure to meet my expectations. (May the powers-that-be
grant me that same gift in raising my children!) I know a lot of really
beautiful people who look in a mirror and only see the hair they wish
was curlier, the butt they think is too big, the nose they wish was
straighter -- and it keeps them from seeing what's lovely and balanced
and right. I think we can be that way with pots unless we allow
ourselves some distance.

On the other hand, I have kept some pots for years -- "too good to sell"
-- that I just one day looked at and said, "GAAAHHH!" and flung them
into a dumpster with great force.

So I'm guessing suck factor is not an exact science.

Life is surreal lately... maybe it's the heat. Maybe it's the library
books. "Devil in the White City" (recommended by a clayarter) led to one
about the great Chicago fire, one about the yellow fever epidemic in
Philadephia, and now a book about Irish history and immigration. (Btw
poor immigrants like Mrs. O'Leary got the blame for both fire and
epidemic, since the poor were convenient scapegoats and nobody had
figured out the mosquito link yet.)

Meanwhile I'm making lesson plans for my kids, cooking big batches of
stuff to freeze, making sure each kid knows how to make a couple of our
favorite suppers, scheduling their classes and sports around my classes.
Packing to camp at Sleeping Bear Dunes, carving out a week in August to
can tomatoes. Anybody out there have a saxophone for sale or barter? My
soon-to-be-13 year old wants lessons...

Last night I had another of these recurring dreams where I am in some
huge complex of airport-hotel-dormitory-subway-campus-train
station-convention center-parking garage, usually late for something,
lost, and holding the wrong ticket/pass/key. Stairways wind and narrow
and dead-end, or become rickety ladders with dog-sized doorways.
Elevators close in like one of those torture compression chambers, drop
without warning, stop between floors, or open to narrow slots I can
barely squeeze my body through. The dream varies -- sometimes more like
a college, sometimes a foreign country, or an absurdist NCECA with a
cast of potters -- (once mel was the shop teacher) - but is always
exhausting. If the dream goes well, I sometimes can find my way outside
and set off on my own with some sense of purpose. It can segue into the
stream-dream.

There is often, at the end of my dream-quest, a little cluster of low
wooden cottage studios like I imagine places like Penland or Haystack
might be, only more primitive... medieval, somehow, hilly, smoky
chimneys and stables, thick hedges of flower and vine. (Maybe that's
Stephani's clay-village) ;0)

And sometimes there's a shamanic figure -- generally played in my dream
by Vince Pitelka (I am not making this up) -- but I wake up before I can
get any questions answered.

I suspect I am blathering, and apologize to those who have to scan past
this long post in the digest format. That's the one they forget when
they say "the delete button is your best friend".

Off to potterbarter to see if I can scare up a saxophone.

Yours
Kelly in hot, hot Ohio... I can only imagine what the Mojave must be
like...

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Marcia Selsor on wed 2 aug 06

Kelly,
It's been 102 here and I am trying to pack up 31 years of living here.
I am finding pieces in boxes in my garage I don't even remember.
This weekend I am billed as a main event.."Good bye Marcia Selsor" sale.
I have pieces from Graduate school (garage) pieces from 1991
installation, etc.
I have three exhibition locations in our warehouse. Your dream
sounds like my life
at the moment. I stop packing to read Clayart...down time.
Stay vivid. I love your stories.
Marcia Selsor
On Aug 1, 2006, at 6:09 PM, primalmommy wrote:

> I have to say I thoroughly enjoyed the last issue of CM. (Trapped
> inside
> with the AC, in these last weeks of summer, I have been drinking
> gallons
> of sun-tea and doing more reading than usual.)
>
> I have heard people describe CM as a little "stuffy" -- but between
> Tony
> Clennell's hands-on, useful theories and the guy who charted his
> lifetime or pots in "suck factor units", I thought this last issue had
> kind of rolled up its sleeves. I am liking the themes every month,
> too.
>
> I keep thinking about the "suck factor" graph -- in particular,
> because
> his chart peaked in grad school -- due, he says, to the pressures and
> influences. I sure hope I am not investing this kind of time and money
> in grad school to make worse pots than I do already!
>
> Maybe it's because when you try a million new things, a large
> percentage
> of them are going to be failed experiments? Maybe grad school will
> push
> me out of my comfort zone, so I'll try what's new instead of what I
> know
> I can make well?
>
> Or maybe if I pump up my ego enough in school, I will decide
> anything I
> do is brilliant, and only later will recognize the truth. I have a
> tiny
> tea set with faces in the area Salon de Refuse show and spent a lot of
> time at the opening puzzling over some of the "art"... as I suspect
> some
> folks scratched their heads over mine.
>
> I guess time will tell.
>
> Suck factor might be hard to chart, too, because of "forgiveness
> variable". I find that if enough time goes by, I forget what I had
> expected the pot to be, and can judge it based on its own qualities
> instead of its failure to meet my expectations. (May the powers-
> that-be
> grant me that same gift in raising my children!) I know a lot of
> really
> beautiful people who look in a mirror and only see the hair they wish
> was curlier, the butt they think is too big, the nose they wish was
> straighter -- and it keeps them from seeing what's lovely and balanced
> and right. I think we can be that way with pots unless we allow
> ourselves some distance.
>
> On the other hand, I have kept some pots for years -- "too good to
> sell"
> -- that I just one day looked at and said, "GAAAHHH!" and flung them
> into a dumpster with great force.
>
> So I'm guessing suck factor is not an exact science.
>
> Life is surreal lately... maybe it's the heat. Maybe it's the library
> books. "Devil in the White City" (recommended by a clayarter) led
> to one
> about the great Chicago fire, one about the yellow fever epidemic in
> Philadephia, and now a book about Irish history and immigration. (Btw
> poor immigrants like Mrs. O'Leary got the blame for both fire and
> epidemic, since the poor were convenient scapegoats and nobody had
> figured out the mosquito link yet.)
>
> Meanwhile I'm making lesson plans for my kids, cooking big batches of
> stuff to freeze, making sure each kid knows how to make a couple of
> our
> favorite suppers, scheduling their classes and sports around my
> classes.
> Packing to camp at Sleeping Bear Dunes, carving out a week in
> August to
> can tomatoes. Anybody out there have a saxophone for sale or
> barter? My
> soon-to-be-13 year old wants lessons...
>
> Last night I had another of these recurring dreams where I am in some
> huge complex of airport-hotel-dormitory-subway-campus-train
> station-convention center-parking garage, usually late for something,
> lost, and holding the wrong ticket/pass/key. Stairways wind and narrow
> and dead-end, or become rickety ladders with dog-sized doorways.
> Elevators close in like one of those torture compression chambers,
> drop
> without warning, stop between floors, or open to narrow slots I can
> barely squeeze my body through. The dream varies -- sometimes more
> like
> a college, sometimes a foreign country, or an absurdist NCECA with a
> cast of potters -- (once mel was the shop teacher) - but is always
> exhausting. If the dream goes well, I sometimes can find my way
> outside
> and set off on my own with some sense of purpose. It can segue into
> the
> stream-dream.
>
> There is often, at the end of my dream-quest, a little cluster of low
> wooden cottage studios like I imagine places like Penland or Haystack
> might be, only more primitive... medieval, somehow, hilly, smoky
> chimneys and stables, thick hedges of flower and vine. (Maybe that's
> Stephani's clay-village) ;0)
>
> And sometimes there's a shamanic figure -- generally played in my
> dream
> by Vince Pitelka (I am not making this up) -- but I wake up before
> I can
> get any questions answered.
>
> I suspect I am blathering, and apologize to those who have to scan
> past
> this long post in the digest format. That's the one they forget when
> they say "the delete button is your best friend".
>
> Off to potterbarter to see if I can scare up a saxophone.
>
> Yours
> Kelly in hot, hot Ohio... I can only imagine what the Mojave must be
> like...
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>

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> _
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Marcia Selsor
http://marciaselsor.com