been awhile!

Wow, sometimes as i work in the studio, i notice that i dont get very far, recently the work has slowed to a crawl, i have started various surface treatments, and adornments that have made a 20min session of throwing and trimming 12 pilsner glasses into over an hour! Potters always say fall is their busy time, I have always agreed, what i didnt know was that if one does not be careful, the next thing you know you have not left enough time to make work. i am two weeks aways from loading the kiln, and have only made about one third the pots i need to make, nothing big has come off the wheel since my big pot session back in june, maybe subconscioulsy i am taking it easy? I have wanted to post about whats been going on in my life and kept telling myuself you need to post, then the devil on my shoulder says, hell no one reads it, stop wasting your time. I finally realized that this is more a diary for me as a way to clear some space upstairs, the head is busy and dizzy. Alot of this time away from the blog has been do to personal issues that i hesitate to write down. the rest has been to overbooking myself. October was a wonderful month, we held our second annual spruce pine potters market, this will grow to be one of those shows folks talk about and must attend. Also in octber it was evans birthday and this year we choose to have an actual party with his whole class, it was a blast. So on to pottery, right now i am teaching tuesday nights at the odyssey center in asheville, running a woodfire class, good group of students out there. we will load and fire in early december so it should be a cold one. i have much to think and do, so i must move back to the dusty studio, traditional NC pots are heavy on my mind, wanting to get down to catawba and connect with kim ellington. two kilns to build next year, and i want to redo my kiln situation. the gama is a large beast to manage and i need to rethink my production cycle, three firings a year is not healthy for me. so time will tell shane

jury duty

Spent the day in Asheville jurying for the four county arts councils grants. What a wonderful experience that is, unlike the jury duty you thought of when you saw the title! i did get called up for that once, actually forgot about it and called halfway Thur the day, lucky me, the case was dropped or something. so being involved in arts councils affairs is always rewarding to me. i spent over three years on the Mitchell/ Yancey county arts council board and in the end just felt overwhelmed by my schedule, so to be asked to be involved again was nice. I truly feel all artists should get involved with their local arts council even at the smallest level. i have had peers complain about various aspects of our local arts council, its easy to get involved and put your opinion out there, so you cant complain if you don't want to be part of the solution. good day, Evan,and Lisa are playing ball with nevi as dusk sets, cant miss anymore of it. Shane

back from the mint

ok so here is the dealio, i know about finding a market, i have had this explained many ways, and recently have become interested in some of these arts business camps, I'd like to hear what they say about niche markets and other aspects of the art business world, that's another time and post. the folks that show up for the mint museums potters market are well educated about pots! they know good pottery when they see it and when they walk in that giant white tent all they see is good pottery or even great pottery! This show every year re enforces to me the importance of putting myself in front of the right crowds. the trick now is to find other venues, or ways to put myself in front of good people who like good pots at a good price. All i need to say is that this show always turns out to be good, everyone was smiling and wanted to talk while we took down our booths, that's the earmark of a good show, we were all happy! time to find more like this one. For me one of the highlights of the weekend was when i tried to buy one of Ben Owen's pots and he insisted on trading with me! the other one was when a lady was looking at one of my larger side fired pots and Nick Jeorling walked buy and whispered in her ear, "he is one of my favorite potters". If it were possible i would take the respect and acknowledgment of my peers over monetary rewards any day of the week, but that doesn't put food on the table now does it. Gotta unload the trailer, clean the house, try to stay away from the brown liquor for a while. bobo out

comments now accepted

ok, so i received word that some folks could not post comments, i found the button and now non members of the blogoshpere can post comments, lets hear em shane, still prepin for the mint

Mint museum show in charlotte

Ok folks, now for the real deal, i talked in my last entry about a certain crappy show (yes, i'm still miffed!), but now i am packing up for one of my favorite shows i have done in the last two years, the mint museums potters market. it is an invitational show held at the randolph road mint museum (not the one downtown). they invite the biggest names in clay from north carolina and also some emerging potters as well. this is a one day show held this saturday sept. 8th from 10 am - 5pm, it is definitely a no miss event! I will be shackin up with my buddy michael kline from okra pottery, goin down early to set up, the two previous years i had drove down saturday morning and set up before the event started, which meant leaving around four am! not this time baby! doin it in style, hopefully by 8pm i will be sipping a double jack on the rocks by the hotel pool, waiting for the coming days' excitement, folks start lining up early and when the gate opens its at least 3 hours of pure crazyiness! Lee Love from japan left a comment on the last entry about shows in japan, his blog is really interesting and one of the ones that pushed my buttons to start my blog (the potters journal by ron philbeck was the other). i do believe that if your work is of a higher level of craft and not just run of the mill stuff, it helps emensily if your surrounded by great work. if your in the area of charlotte this weekend please check out this show. will report back to you after the show wish me luck!

learnins from the front

OK so how about a report for Lazy daze, one word, CRAPPY! way to much buy/sell there. lets just call it a lesson learned, OH, whats the lesson you say?! well when you walk the show early in the A.M. and notice 25% of they booths are low priced buy sell items, most of the "craft" is poorly made, you see lots of $10 stickers (bright yellow too) you might as well go get your change from your booth and head to the beer garden! not kidding, anyway that's why if you make good work and price it realistically (i define this as work that is above the average and sells for a dollar amount that allows you to take your time and "create" good work, not crank out schloopity schloop!) you can not go to these shows where the organizers allow vendors who break the rules CLEARLY STATED in the contract sent to them to stay set up. This brings the quality of the show way down and makes it near impossible to sell good honestly priced work. what is worse is the general public is getting an education when they attend these festivals and when they are bombarded with kitschy junk, pre-made SHIT, and way low prices they just received their mickey mouse PhD in craft education. well i for one have had it with alot of these show promoters/ organizers. i have a few shows where you are cared for and not seen as a dollar sign. but in all honesty what are the next generation of craft artists to do? this use to be the staging grounds for a budding artist. Two of my close friends set up at the show, they are admittedly scratching to get by and they invest a few hundred dollars and lots of time in a show that just leaves them dead in the ally, like a rat! well, i gotta go pull handles before i pull my hair out! Today was actually a good day, Evan did a speech test and passed with flying colors, then went to the dentist for his first check up, he was brave as hell! so today i was the windshield! OK off to work, peace out, don't eat the trout! Shane a.k.a BOBO (PS that's for you rump shaker, i know your watching me now)

off to a show again

So its that time again, off to a show! cary nc for lazy daze, hope its a goodin. wow, so its like fall is chasing me down. Lisa is back in school full time again, and evan starts montessori up next week. last year i worried that the school days would interrupt my studio time to an unhealthy extent. now this year i am looking forward to school starting, it adds a certain amount of structure to the day that really pushes me to organize my time more wisely, plus it pushes studio time into the late evening hours, nothing like finishing a pot at 1 0r 1 a.m.! the silence and solitude is great. I am currently in a rush to make a small batch of pots for a firing in mark peters kiln I use to fire his kiln with him on a regular basis until the anagama was finished. That's the hard thing about a large anagama kiln. i can not just organize a firing when i need it! my crew all have jobs or are potters filling and firing their own kilns, so i have to schedule firings far in advance. i do need a smaller kiln (do i hear train whistles?) But i do need to fill in some holes in my inventory for my upcoming shows and still generate a full load for my November anagama firing. A quick word about Mr. Peters, he was there in a capacity like no other (except my wife!) when we got started over here. He always had space in his kiln for me and at one point was even letting me fire the wood kiln when he was out of town, now that is generosity! a good man indeed, thanks mark! ok sponge bob mac and cheese is done, gotta run evans hungry! (dont judge or hate the sponge bob!) later shane

arrowmont trip

Well, i went off on a trip to Atlanta to pick up a pot that was juried into the acc south east regoinal show, then up to arrowmont for the night. The school had invited several people to load and fire the anagama a few of my friends were involved so it became a must for me to drop in. I arrived at dinner time and the kiln was near the end of its firing. good firing styles were being used. meet some nice folks from norway and the us. good times. came home to see my new camera had arrived, a canon G7! off to play. now we are heading up north to west virginia for my family visit. happy potting/

evening time

Well, its before 7pm and the house has settled down a bit, evan is quietly playing, lisa is off to a study group (finals in am!). I realized after i set the page up that there are no pics of lisa and evan on it (working on that) and no pics of my pots, so here is a sample if i can get it to work. anyway, one of the topics i want to write about is the current culture of ceramics, academia vs craft world. its funny i remember defending pottery as art in grad school, now i look at the ceramic community in a different light and it seems that either your in the academic/ residency world or your out beating the pavement trying to make money off what you earned your degree in! over the last two years i have noticed a clear line between those who understand and are informed about the business end of being a potter and those who chase the rockstar world side of ceramics. there are those who do both but the majority are either on one side of the fence or the other. this idea is probably taboo, but it feels like the ceramics community is starting to feed in on itself and is less about reaching the general public. just some thoughts before i draw evans tub water and get him ready for bed. later folks

hellos

Well i do not have a lot of time to wax poetically about this new blog. i hope to shed some light into the life of a potter. I will regularly post about topics such as daily life, craft shows, business, family life and whatever else comes to my brain. be on the lookout for new posts soon.