A long career of learning

​Saving face.....

It took me years to learn and understand that pottery carried a history that stretched far beyond my imagination. I never realized the importance of clay for anthropological research.  If my first studio would have been an archaeological site, they will probably find shards, telling interesting stories of us few women that had so much fun in our garage studio and maybe they would find the first signs of the birth of my passion for clay. It became a lifelong love affair, one that I never would have managed, was it not for my dear husband and his patience with me. (oh he still did not eat his hat as he said he would do if I become a potter!)

I was not fortunate enough to learn about clay through generational inheritance, as the ancient people probably did. I did not even know at first that clay is earth and it was a big "aha" moment for me when I realized that clay in a kiln and rocks forming from lava had strong similarities. When I decided I have to start teaching pottery, I never thought that I started on a path in which I created footprints that may have some permanence. Having that knowledge now, puts on me an obligation to make sure that any piece I fire not just holds beauty in its core, but also an intelligence of good craftsmanship and expression value to last for millenniums to come.

My career came a long way from those very first days with clay. It became a profession that took me across the world and that gave me opportunities to show and teach my porcelain in which I ended up specializing,  to potters around the globe.  The latest highlight is showing my work with a group of internationally recognized potters in a New Members Exhibition in Beijing China. The show was canceled earlier this year due to the pandemic, so it just opened recently as a virtual show at the Guozhong Ceramic Art Museum

​A few Historical facts about pottery

I mentioned anthropologists. It is one of their specialty fields to have an interest in clay objects. Did you know that shards can tell us about ancient technology and human behavior? Since clay is preserved by fire, it carries footprints and cultural evidence that cannot easily be distinguished. 
I came across this you tube video that explains how they translate images and marks from clay into historical facts: The presenter has a lively way in which he explains the importance of pottery shards to read ancient history.
It took me years to learn and understand that pottery carried a history that stretched far beyond my imagination. I never realized the importance of clay for anthropological research.  If my first studio would have been an archaeological site, they will probably find shards, telling interesting stories of us few women that had so much fun in our garage studio and maybe they would find the first signs of the birth of my passion for clay. It became a lifelong love affair, one that I never would have managed, was it not for my dear husband and his patience with me. (oh he still did not eat his hat as he said he would do if I become a potter!)
I also found this beautiful website with information about the Ancestral Pueblo cultures found in the regions where Arizona, New Mexico, Utah and Colorado meets, known as “The Four Corner area” It is believed that the Pueblo people descended from nomadic living styles and gathered here some 12 thousand years ago. Their pottery has a significant influence on American pottery; to this day.