ART, LOVE, BREATHING

The other day I was thinking about my granddaughter Katie. She sings constantly, dances and plays music. You could not stop her, even if you wanted to. She is compelled to sing – it’s simply a part of her that cannot be unwound from who she is.
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That is the way I feel about clay. I dream it and am driven to do it all the time. I can’t stop myself from constantly creating! Everything I look at inspires me to make something. In nature I see textures, colors, rhythms and compositions. As I drive past a hydrant or water pipes, I see colors and shapes that inspire me.

Ideas come to me in dreams, while I’m doing yoga, meditating or walking. I may be eating or having a conversation, and ideas will fly into me – they never stop! If I can’t put my ideas into clay form immediately, I sketch them. I have sketchbooks that are full of ideas and lists of things to do.
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I don’t want to lose one piece of an idea, so I write it and draw it, and save it for later.
During the times in my life when I was unable to make clay art – I made other kinds of art, compulsively. I sketched, made quilts, did pastels, sewed, made Christmas ornaments out of baker’s clay.
 
If I had nothing but a mud pile, I would continue to sculpt with joy. But happily, I am equipped with clay, a wheel and a couple of kilns. With their help, it’s easy to bring my ideas to life.

I am compelled to do art. It’s not like an addiction. It’s more like breathing.
 
Did you know that love inhabits the same part of our brains as creativity? When I left marriage behind, my creativity bloomed. This is not an advertisement to become unmarried in order to create art! But for me, it is essential to not be married because there is no room left in that part of my brain that creates art non-stop.
 
Art for me is a single-minded, all-encompassing and constant focus. I eat and breathe it, I wake to it, I talk and think about it all the time. How could I ever stop?
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The quiet serenity of using my hands to shape a sculpture, or a vessel or pot on the wheel is the most fulfilling thing I’ve ever done in my life. But it’s also a necessity for me, for my very life and well-being.
 
Art is the way I connect with the world – with nature, and with people. It is my strongest mode of expression.
 
Art erupts from me, it flows as if it was poured through me.