You pull the bowl down from your shelf and feel the uneven rim, my fingerprints forever recorded in stoneware.
You look at the one of a kind glazing on the outside and pause to think about how wonderful, how astounding that I manage to create such natural beauty to the humming background music of “Mommy mommy mommy, I want gomitas!” (fruit snacks). Our souls connect. And then you pour in a nourishing quinoa/raspberry/coconut milk porridge. A slow, centering, meaningful way to start the day. Perfect.
When we find ancient potsherds on the mountain by our home in Mexico, I quietly thrill to rub them between my fingers and think of the hands that made them. I can tell that hands made them, not because my intellect knows that must be so, but because I can feel the subtle changes in thickness that are a natural result of the pots’ being pinched and formed by human hands.
I can feel this connect my soul to the soul of the maker.
The same thing happens when you hold one of my pinch pot bowls. The difference being that, quite handily, you can also eat food out of a bowl I’ve made, seeing as it’s a bowl and not a potsherd. Also, you can know a lot more about me than I can know about the people who made those potsherds. (Like via my private Patreon feed where I share the inner thoughts behind my ceramic sculptures!)
To make each bowl, I knead a lump of clay the size of an unshelled walnut into a tight ball. Then pinch pinch pinch it into a bowl while my toddler runs around rummaging through boxes of tools and “fixing” everything in my studio. Believe me, the quiet, slow, orderly process of slowly pinching out a ball of clay into a six inch sphere with even walls and smooth sides is a much appreciated counterpoint to the rambunctious chaos of living with a three year old.
How can you be first in line for a one of a kind bowl?
The first, hand-numbered run of these one of a kind bowls are all pinched out and waiting for some kiln repairs to happen so that I can fire them. Soon, I’ll be decorating these pinch pot bowls with oxides and glazes and getting them ready to offer for sale first to my Patreon Patrons (one of the many perks of being in my inner circle!).