Eden Richman Week 2 - I'm Literally Obsessed with Ceramics

    I used to be a ride-or-die art person. I enjoyed the way paint glided smoothly across a canvas. I loved colored pencils and watercolors and even pencil drawings. Going from stage to stage of a piece of art was therapeutic, first I would sketch, then refine it, then add color, and finally add finishing touches of highlights and shadows that make the work come to life. Sculping with clay in my eyes was something that children do. My only memory of loving sculpting is in fact kindergarten recess where my friends and I found clay-like mud in the playground and built things out of it. After getting yelled at by my teacher for playing around in the mud, I didn't touch clay until 9th grade at Donna Klein.

    After learning a lot of techniques and ways of making things, I decided that clay wasn't just a childish thing to play with. I gradually started enjoying it more and more and watching myself progress in the process. Tenth grade made me love ceramics even more just because of the people I was in the class with. It was a group of around five of us all in the same grade, and we all joked around and laughed. The environment in the room was just very nice. I learned a lot in tenth grade, like how it is possible to mix glazes and come out with completely unpredictable colors, and how underglazes work differently than glazes, and that tools can be used for so many purposes like texture and sculpting. I didn't make many good things that year, I actually don't like any of the pieces that I made that year, but it was a class that I always looked forward to. 

    This year I was hoping for another tenth grade (just with better art) but I didn't get as lucky. This year though, I have all my past knowledge and also have no distractions from friends, which just leaves me alone with my artwork. I don't know how to explain the childlike excitement that I feel each time I walk into the kiln room not knowing what my glaze turned out like. I love that most of the art is controlled by me and in my hands, but the magic of it happens inside the kiln, where it almost creates itself. It is just like art, where I have stages. I sculpt it first, attach all the pieces together, then I have to wait for it to get "leather hard" and then add all the textures. But my favorite part - and a part that I think distinguishes it from just painting - is giving up my control, and letting the clay and the glaze behave the way they see fit.