This past weekend I found the need to bring back one of my old hobbies, wheel based ceramics. I have always loved working with clay, but up until tonight I had forgotten what a challenge it is to get started with something on the wheel, all the work with the clay before you can even get it to the wheel, and of course the actual effort to make something that doesn’t look like shit. My biggest issue is that I am not remembering the exact texture needed in the clay before it can be successfully wheel built. I am considering forgetting about the wheel for a little while and going with hand building using the coil method for now and maybe progressing on with the coil method to being on the wheel for the final smoothing. Eventually I should be able to get fully back on the wheel again. It has been a long time I feel that I need to retrain myself for the wheel and all of the associated techniques. Another issue I am having is my need to actually be clean with the clay, I used to be so messy with it and now I am actually concious of the fact that I shouldn’t be making messes, however, being clean is not part of the artistic proccess. I have always been fascinated with the art of ceramics, it is so hard to get right, but yet so easy to screw up. One drop of a piece can destroy hours (or even days) of work. At the moment im working with some air-drying home-use clay, but my professional clay is on its way via UPS, so hopefully things will go better with it. Actually, im counting on things going better with it, since I ordered 50lbs of it. I have gone so long without doing any molding, sculpting or ceramic techniques that I have lost touch with the medium, and I find myself needing to reaquainted with it, and get back to understanding the medium and its quirks. I lack artistic talent, but working with clay makes me happy, so I do it and to me thats all that matters.
What I find strange is that pieces I made with clay years ago, back when I was between 7 and 15 still exist and are on display in my home as well as in my aunt’s home. My family has this weird attachment to my horrid creations, I don’t know why.
I have considered taking a ceramics course but am not fully certain about it, I don’t really know how being in an academic environment with something I love this much will affect me. I have done it with networking and computer stuff, but thats different, there is a lot to it and it is a very intellectual science, but ceramics is not, ceramics is more about the feel of the clay and the feeling of being in your own world, hypnotised by the spinning of the wheel as the piece comes together in front of your eyes.