Being naked!

Imagine The Rat buck naked! He's actually more pink like the earthware Rat yunomi. The one wood fired yunomi is showing a bit of his pink flesh. I've been organizing this HUGE inventory of pots I have in every cupboard and on every horizonal surface of my house. Yes, I took the door off the linen closet and put shelves in it to hold an overflow of pots. I still have cupboards full of pots not on display. It's a shame really! As I get older I wonder what is going to happen to all my treasures. They are treasures to me but not anyone else. Every pot I own has a story of a lifetime in the clay world. I thought I'd show you Ronnie the Rat with no clothes on. He's blushing! Y'all would recognize one of Ronnie's painted and "The Usual Suspects" pots from across the room but my guess you would be stumped by these two sippers of his. They are pots Ronnie gave me after our yearly clay family gathering firing his Ratagama in Athens,GA. I really love Ronnie's trimming. Some look trimmed on the wheel and others look hand trimmed. They always have an edge! Not smooth and polished but more sharp and tactile. Sometimes I display them on my cupboard called The Wall of Shame upside down so I can walk by and be reminded to slow down and make a mark like ya mean it! As I approach my pilgrimage to The Bray I think about being naked. Changing the shino shirt and the carbon trap trousers and the Albany Blundies. I want it to be more about edge,not polished, not glazed and taking it slow with no expectations of the market place embracing it. This time away is for me and I want to keep it that way. I've worked tirelessly for the past decades making some and some. Some for me and some for the marketplace. This fall it's all for me. I'm not even sure I'll like it! A memory from a Critical Thinking workshop I took with the amazing late Stephen Hogbin (wood sculpture extrodinaire). Stephen said " Always look longest at what you think you don't like! It is from that you will learn the most. If we always make what is safe and do what is safe we never grow. If you had never taken the scrapes learning to ride your bike you would still be walking. Ride on!