The Cliff

This year it seems I've been all over the globe teaching. Haven't had a lot of time for my own work but that said I've learned a lot about clay and the people that teach it.  It seems everywhere I go students have teachers that present a lot of rules on what needs to be done to make a pot. I just laugh under my breath. These are rules that are meant to keep students as students and demonstrate power.
One must wedge a piece of clay 100 times. One must take that piece of clay and wheel wedge by making a cone 5 times before making a pot. One must do this and that.
I laughed watching my cousin Brenda Smith make pots today. She has made hundreds of thousands of pots over her 40+ years and she doesn't have a wedging table in the studio. Never has! Well she does have this rickety old thing that wobbles and never gets used.  She pugs the clay

This is production throwing-Brenda Smith

This is what I am capable of but no longer do. The training ground.

Still want to be a potter?

, cuts into the correct weight and throws it. Clay from a clay supplier has come to you from a pug mill worth hundreds of thousands of dollars. This is not clay dug from the ground.
The students in Italy told me my throwing made them nervous. I don't really centre. I think it is but it is probably off a bit. So what? Learn the rules and then learn how to creatively break them.
Brenda just laughs at people wedging a one pound ball of clay. She will have made 5 bowls while they are still wedging the clay.
I maintain people tip toe to the cliff but the cliff is 11 miles away. I tiptoed and then jumped.