Anderson Ranch: Day Two

Anderson Ranch is truly a fabulous place. After lunch today, I was sitting on a porch swing outside the studio, just feeling incredibly lucky and fortunate to be here. A beautiful campus, incredible teachers, happily focused students, good food, gorgeous weather. It's awesome.

Yesterday, we made some pots that incorporated two circles, either in shape (think foot or rim) or volume. After that, we were to choose one pot and draw the contour or profile line of that pot. This is much harder than it sounds! What you don't realize at first is that you're drawing what you WANT the pot to look like, not what it actually looks like. It took me seven sheets of large newsprint, full of contours, to actually draw what was there. After that, we were to pick a couple of contours that looked good to us and throw some pots with those contours. That's what we have on the right here. The original form is the bottle on the left, and the bottles on the right were thrown to the chosen contour lines.

Today, we were to add a third circle to our pots, again as shape or volume. Here are the drawings I did before I sat down at the wheel. I'm realizing that it's much easier to work out these visual design issues on paper than on the wheel. I love this sheet of drawings. It may find a place on the wall in my studio at home.

The next goal was to throw some pots from these drawings. Here are mine. I never make bottles, so I'm pretty happy with how these turned out. I think they make a groovy little collection. I'm fortunate that we're working with a sandy stoneware body, because I had to push this clay around a lot to get these forms!

I'm beginning to see how this "design" process can be a fabulous tool in a potter's visual toolbox. It's important to learn from our teachers what questions to ask ourselves, and to learn exercises to help us move forward in our work. Most of us make good progress in classes or workshops, when someone else is asking the questions; the thing to take away from them is HOW to make progress when your work gets stagnant. I think these design exercises, combined with the "What grabs you?" exercise from earlier this summer, could support an artist for a lifetime.