I had an interesting phone call today at work. A girl called because she “wanted some information on… uhhh …..pottery”. She wanted to throw floor vases for her portfolio to show the local university. She told me she wanted to be an artist so she needs to make floor vases. Her logic not mine.
She wanted to know what you need to make a three foot vase. I told her twenty or thirty years on the wheel would be a start. She had never made a pot. She had no access to a studio, but how hard can it be, she has seen it done on TV and she thought it looked really cool. I said it was like wanting to play with Eric Clapton this week end, what do you need to know?
She didn’t know who Eric Clapton was. Oh well, I guess you can’t pot for over thirty years and not be an old fart.
We had a good day at the studio. We loaded the 10 for a bisque and the 16 for a glaze. I forgot the camera so I don’t have any pics to post.
Tomorrow Jim goes to Calgary to show the Safe Driving DVD to the head oil dudes. It is good. They had done a great job, they should be proud.
Safety Jim meets the world, or the world meets Safety Jim, one or the other.
Tomorrow I keep on glazing. As soon as the kilns are unloaded, they will be loaded again. This coming weekend we are doing our first retail show in a long time, a couple of years anyway. I have only had a few weeks to prepare. It will be tight, the pots will still be warm when the show doors open.
The Pot Blog has been neglected this last while. The studio has gone through some changes. The first being Jim has taken a job outside of the studio. When he is not at his new job he is at the studio. It takes most of his time and that is why he has not kept the blog up to date. By now you will have gleaned that Jim is not writing and by process of elimination, figgered that the only one in the studio besides Jim is me, Cindy, the now Pot Plogger. That sounds nasty, " you dirty pot blogger you". We simple were not making enough money. The long hours and hard work weren’t paying off. Also it is not fun anymore so it is time to make some changes. Jim is making videos with the fellow who shot our pottery DVD. Their first one is on driving safety for an oil company in Calgary. It will be finished next week. It is the first of many to be produced for this client. We are all very excited about it. He is the face and voice of this new venture and now known by those who want to get under his skin as "Safety Jim" I have been trying to keep up with the orders we took in August at the wholesale show. No matter how hard I try, I am not able to do the work of two. I have had to let some of the new clients go and put off some of my regulars. Everyone has been very understanding and patient. I have to admit that sometimes I do loose sight of what I am doing. After all, I am only making pots. If "they" don’t have pots for sale "they" will sell something else. The production line will go through changes as well. I am going to cut back on the smaller items, like hundreds of mugs and start to focus on the larger more artsy pieces, I think that if I am not going to make a whole lot of money doing this I might just as well make what I like. I don’t intend to ever get a "real job". I will take the camera to work tomorrow and post some of the new things I have been working on.