Art, Life, and Egypt

I started this little blog in 2011 when I was in my second year at San Jose State University.  It feels like a long time ago, so much has happened, so much has changed. So where the hell have I been and what have I been doing? First, I finally graduated in 2012. After 18 years of trying, I finally received my degree in ceramics (and another in anthropology).  My senior show was such a great experience, and I look back at it fondly.

Straddling the 405, 2012

I also showed this piece at the CCACA conference (California Conference for the Advancement of the Ceramic Arts). It was a great experience.  While at the conference I saw a former teacher of mine, Tony Marsh.

 I hadn't seen him in about 15 years and it was great to catch up and share stories. (Btw, if you are not familiar with his work, do yourself a favor and check it out!)





In September 2012, I was featured in the Undergraduate Student Showcase in Ceramics Monthly.  It was a huge honor and I was crazy proud.  It had been my dream since I was 14 to be in Ceramics Monthly and I can't express how much gratitude I felt.  The only bummer was they put the image of my piece sideways, but oh well, I was just glad to be chosen.


I also sold my first large sculpture to a collector in Northern California.  It was actually completely by accident but it was a valuable lesson.  It was the first piece I made in my wind series. It was hard to let it go, mostly because I had never actually planned on selling it.  Lesson learned, never put something for sale on Etsy unless you really want to sell it. I had made an Etsy account just to have a web presence for a competition I was entering.  Once it sold, well, I figured it was too late.

Passage 2011

Although I was accepted into the American Craft Council show in San Francisco, I decided to not participate and ended up being in the now-defunct Ceramics Annual of America.  It was a lot of fun and I felt like I was slowly becoming a "real artist". The exposure I received from being in this show led to another opportunity.

In January 2013, I was in my first museum at the De Sassait Museum. It was exciting and stressful. I always focused on making work but almost everything I made wasn't made with the intention for it to last. This presented a problem with displaying work in professional settings.  Nonetheless, I felt like I had actually started a career as compared to just being a student.  For most, this type of success would make you stay on the path and continue doing what was working, but for me, it felt like more then I wanted.  I had a lot of momentum but I also didn't like the direction I was headed.  I started to question everything I was doing and nothing felt right.

 

In March 2013, I was fortunate enough to be selected for the NCECA Student Show which was in Houston that year.  I made the mistake of submitting two pieces; one was roughly 3' x 4' and the other was 30" x 10'.  Silly me, I was thinking they would never choose a piece that was 10 feet long. Boy oh boy was I wrong.  Another lesson learned, never enter a piece unless you know how to ship it and have the money to properly do so. Because of this show, I was in Ceramics Monthly again.  The September 2013 issue had an article that reviewed the NCECA Student show. I was really excited to be in it again. Unfortunately, the article had an error stating I was a grad student when in fact I was an undergrad.  I never said anything.

   

  After NCECA, I was asked if I wanted to do a member story for the NCECA blog. Of course, I was flattered and said yes! This was the last thing I would do to promote myself or my work.  After that, I stepped back and stopped pursuing a clay as a career.  What most people didn't know was that I was in a terrible marriage and after 15 years, it had taken its toll on me.  Being in an abusive relationship changes you in many ways, and it's a hard thing to re-wire your brain.  I had to stop focusing on clay and start focusing on getting out.  It was, without a doubt, the hardest thing I had ever done, and it took me two years to truly call it quits. 

After, I felt renewed. I was a woman on fire and discovered a new passion for life and travel. I fell in love with my now husband and spent two years living part-time in Cairo, Egypt.  It was such an adventure.  I also traveled to Italy and Denmark.  Living in Egypt had a profound effect on me.  The best way to describe it is slow chaos.  As a lover of art and history, it was a feast for the eyes. There are so many contradictions in Egypt. I was freer then I had ever been and yet more oppressed.  I was able to live a lifestyle I could only dream of in the US but in my heart, I still knew I was poor. Living in Egypt also gave me time to explore new art materials. I spent time experimenting with new ways of making all the while thinking of how to incorporate them into my ceramic work. I was able to travel because I worked as a substitute teacher in Oakland.  This also taught me so much.  The culmination of living and working in two vastly different places helped guide me to where I am now, in terms of my art.  I'm truly grateful for these experiences.  They left such a profound impact on me that I gave a lecture at NCECA 2018 regarding travel and the art practice.

At the end of 2016, I transitioned back into living just in the US and started to focus on clay again. I got a job teaching ceramics to adults in a studio in San Francisco and also worked full time at a ceramic supply store.  With my husband now living in the US, I was free to focus on what I had wanted for years: grad school.  When I graduated in 2012, my son was 12 and I told myself I wouldn't go to grad school till he graduated high school.  Now he was a Junior and I was ready to focus on creating new work for my portfolio.  In early 2017, I quit teaching and reduced my hours at work so I could focus on creating.  I was finally where I wanted to be after 5 years.  A week after, I found out I was pregnant.  

@needleandsponge

Pregnancy at 40 sucked. Pregnancy at 24, by comparison, was a walk in the part.  I had lots of complications and went to the hospital twice within the first two months. I realized I couldn't work and so I reluctantly left.  As the pregnancy continued, it became harder and harder.  I felt like I was awake in a coma.  My entire body was just trying to feed a baby and I felt I had nothing left for myself.  It was the worst I had ever felt.  At four months, I had a miscarriage two days before my birthday.  So many women have had miscarriages, but you never realize the weight of one until you go through it yourself.  It was horrendously painful. My husband and I mourned the loss, as couples do.  I spent the summer trying to redirect my focus back to trying to go to school.  I worked in clay and for the first time in decades, I committed myself to start a pottery business.  I was excited to have direction again.  It was fall, school started back up and the first day I went back to work my body decided to strike.  My right arm and right lower leg swelled up and I was in tremendous pain.  It lasted for weeks and months.  The years of repetition and wearing my body down had apparently paid their price.  I saw multiple doctors that each gave a different diagnosis but at the end of the day, all I knew was I was in pain.  My doctor told me no more clay. 

Photoshop Class Project

So what was I to do? well, I started to draw, a lot.  It was a lot of fun rekindling my old love of drawing but eventually, that too was too much for my poor hand.  The pain became so severe that I couldn't even brush my hair.  I did months of occupational therapy and tried to use my hands as little as possible. I was really bored but I tried to use this time learning new things on youtube and exploring creativity in ways I never would have considered prior.  When your body is limited your mind has time to flourish.  I spent so much time thinking of work I would make when I got better and researching ideas, places, and people.  I wanted to learn about digital fabrication. My abilities with computers were lacking and so when I started feeling better, I enrolled in a few graphic design classes. Which brings us to today, midway in my second semester as a graphic design student.

It's amazing where life can take you.  I never in my wildest dreams would have thought I'd be this happy.  I also never would have thought that I'd go through that much shit, but that's part of life. You gotta take the bitter with the sweet.  Right now, I'm totally focused on the sweet!  

Visit: Suyama Space

After attending the lecture Panel: Distillations and Eruptions: Installation at NCECA, I was compelled to visit Suyama Space. 

It was my last day in Seattle and I was finally alone since my hotel roommates left by car for California.  I had about 6 hours to kill before my flight and top on the list of things to see was Suyama Space.  So, in the rain I walked and walked until I came upon it.  I almost thought I was in the wrong place since I didn't know that you actually had to go through the architectural office of  Suyama Peterson Deguchi to get to the gallery.  Fortunately, I ventured in. 

Boy oh boy, it didn't disappoint.  The curator, Beth Sellars, let me in and for about an hour,  I stood, listened, explored, and soaked up what was in front of me, while a gentle rain seemed to wash away time. The sight specific instillation that was up, Uprising by Rick Araluce and Steve Peters , might seem unimpressive to the uninformed eye but closer inspection revealed much deeper thought.  PVC pipe painted in a Trompe l'oeil style to resemble old cast iron pipes echoed the turn-of-the-century industrial feel of the interior.  Prior to the pipe being installed, several recordings were made within the space, capturing the squeeks and moans of the old wooden building.  These recordings were played in different pipes, depending on which pipe you listened to. 

When I pressed my ear to the pipe and listened I was blown away.  It was as if the building was talking, whispering stories of its long past in a language long forgotten.  The only word that came to mind: genius.  With the begnin objects of pipes, paint, and a recording , they created an experience that I will so not forget and I have never experienced anything quite like it. 

At Suyama Space, there is no shortage of genius.  So many of the past shows seemed to offer this unparalleled exchange between art and viewer.   Here are a few of their past shows:

The instillation Nascant, by artist Gerri Sayler, created of just long strands of hot glue just screamed simple beauty.

 

 Seeps of Winter by John Grade whos encounter with a dead humback whale inspired the recreated whale skin texture out of cast paper, cellulose and glassine.





Grotesque Arabesque, by Dan Corson



The lecture and visit has really called me to question the self imposed limitations with in my own work.  These instillations, if nothing else, transform the space they are in were viewer becomes participant; art becomes experience.  I need some of that! 

My 1st NCECA

After being torn by weather to go to NCECA or not, and risk loosing valueable time for my show, I came to an important realization.  This isn't the end, it's the begining.  All that time I had been looking at it the wrong way.  I was so fixated on having this perfect show that I didn't realize this was just a stepping stone, the first of many, and that it was OK to have it less then perfect.  So, with that new insight I decided to go. 

It was great for so many reasons.  Seeing so much top notch art in one place was really wonderful.  The Seattle Deign Center had a particularly great assorment of shows under the same roof.  It was the first time I saw the work of Christina Cordova, Erin Furmisky, Jason Briggs, Christina Antemann, Deborah Schartzkopf to name a few.  There is no substitute for seeing ceramics in person, soo much is lost in pictures.  The idiosyncracies of the glaze on the Christina Cordova's sculpture in  A Show of Heads is quite simply, magic and I'm glad I could experience that first hand. 

The lectures were very informative but one stood out above the others.  Panel: Distillations and Eruptions: Installation Today was not only informative but inspirational.  In particular, Beth Sellars curatorial work at Suyama Space.  Slide after slide, I was intriqued, enthrauled, and inspired.  Only one of the artists shown made ceramic work, the rest were mixed media artists utlizing such experimental materials as: river rocks, hot glue, string, pvc pipe, and steel spikes to build the core of their work.  Each artist not only presented innovative, conceptual work but owned the space with power, simplicity, and elegance.  Qualities I not only admire in the work of others, but also strive for in my own.  I was so impressed with what I saw that I took a pilgrimage of sorts to this place that seemed to speak to me, and it did not disappiont. (I think it deserves its own post, so more details and pics will come).

At the Foster White Gallery, I had the chance of seeing an instillation by Shay Church, a fellow San Jose State alum.

I also got the chance to check out the ceramics studio at University of Washington, and talked to the lab tech there. I've been grad school shopping for some time and thought that this would be the perfect opportunity to check them out.  After looking around, I was particularly impressed with the 3D emphasis.  The inclusion of glass and sculpture as essentially part of the same larger studio fostered use of multiple materials and that was evident in the student work I saw.

Overall, (besides the constant rain which I guess is to be expected) I had a great time, and look forward to next year in Houston, Texas.

NCECA, here I come?

When I found out that this year's NCECA would be in Seattle, I was incredibly excited.  I knew it would be much cheaper to fly to and best of all, school is footing the bill for the hotel.  Having never been to  NCECA, I was super excited about going with the Ceramics Department from San Jose State. 

So, What's the problem? 

Well, in the course of being a grown-up you must sometimes make hard decisions.  I have a solo show (my first) coming up in late April.  I've been working like mad to keep up with that, and school, and work, and home (husband, kid, a clean house).  I'm behind on just about everything.  I can't seem to squeeze enough hours out of a day.  Now this wouldn't be such a problem if I weren't a perfectionist.  But, I am and OCD to boot, so now can see the dilemma.  I have this visualization of the gallery and each piece in the show exactly the way I want them and to have anything less will feel like failure. Now, four days of no work or school would go a long way to get me caught up, but I would lament missing such a great trip.  I've already paid for the plain ticket and I haven't gone on a trip by myself since 1998. 

Its a hard choice. 

Come Wednesday, 6:30 am I will have to decide if I get on that plain or not, or it will be made for me!

Artist Spotlight: Janet Echelman



Two words: Breath taking

To say that I am a fan of Janet Echelmen's work is an understatement.  To create work that is imbued with such beauty, power, and delicacy is the trifecta that I strive for in my own work.  Organic yet technologically engineered, ephemeral yet durable, these installations bring the idiosyncrasies of nature into the densest of city scapes.  I am equal parts in awe and jealous.  And to think she never went to art school!





Year of the Dragon

So, I'm not usually one for superstitions and such, but this year is year of the dragon in the Chinese zodiac. I'm a year of the dragon baby and I can't help but feel a little excited about the year to come.  I feel like the universe is finally on my side sayin," Ok, Spring I got your back."  And that feels pretty great.  My optimism is boundless: my determination unyielding. It feels like this is gonna be my year, but does that mean it's time to buy lotto tickets?  Well, maybe not, but more importantly its time to enter shows, make some great art, and get my name out there.  For 21 years, I have been pursing my craft: learning, reading, experimenting in relative solitude.  It has been nice and safe.  But tomorrow I will sign up for my first gallery show.  Yes, it's at school.  Yes, it's long over due.  But for me it will be a milestone that I have looked forward to for a very long time.  I'm excited and terrified.  I really don't wanna suck.  But first, I have to wait in line and fight it out with other students just to wrangle the spot.  I am told that the line for gallery sign-ups is something like the line at Walmart on Black Friday, in Oakland.  So common dragon don't fail me now!

Taking the Plunge

As I type this first post, while sitting on my sofa in my pj's, I am wondering about the road ahead.  Trying to make a go as an artist, crafter, entrepreneur, or what ever you want to call it, seems crazy and perfect at the same time.  Yeah the economys in the toilet.  I know, I know, consumer spending is way down.   That's right, unemployment is high.  But sometimes you got nothing to loose, and everything to gain.  Either way, I'm in it all the way. 

What do I expect from the future? Lots, and lots of hard work to get the ball rolling, a general reduction in the number of hours I sleep, long hours in the studio, countless hours marketing, many trips to the library for new book on blogging, twitter, online sales, and plenty of self promotion.  But first, I better get those dishes done.

Bye