Part of mug collection …
You can imagine what potters collect … and you’d be right. We collect pots!
These mugs are from all over, and every time I sit down for a coffee or tea there’s a recollection of where it came from and who made it (some are even mine …). I used to do a fair number of pottery shows, and every time I did a show I bought a mug — even snuck them in for a while! They’re great lesson holders for me as well. Which one of these mugs has a comfortable handle? Which has a good feel to the mouth, and so on. I bring them out when I’m teaching classes so people can pick them up and compare them. I’ve even bought some ‘bad’ mugs to see if they can pick them out from the crowd.
But there’s an even more important aspect to our collections though … and that’s the people we accumulate while working in clay. I’d say that probably 75% of my friends are potters, clay artisans, previous/present students, or artists in other mediums. (The other 25% are sailors or part of my Buddha Dharma family — in case you’re wondering.) I’ve collected these people (don’t keep them on permanent display though) along and throughout my clay career, and they are the best part of this whole deal. We help each other out. I’ve had other potters actually do shows for me when I’ve been sick. We help each other load and unload. We pick up supplies, cripes, sometimes we even share pots! How great is that? It’s not what I thought of when I decided to let my ‘profession’ go some years ago and decided to move on into the arts full time — but I’m so grateful that it’s been the turn of events for me. The only thing that would make it even better is if one of them decided they’d like to garden for free … there’s a lot of work to be done here to get these darn gardens ready for winter!
I’m off to buy pots (can you believe it?) for the garden plants that have to come in this winter. Have a full kiln load of student work to come out tomorrow, but that’s another day!
Hope you’re having a great day,
Susan McD
