9:36am Saturday December 8th 2012, Athens Georgia, in the Boulevard neighborhood somewhere between Chase street and Nacoochee, perhaps on Nantahala ave in the vicinity of the speed bump in the middle of that block…. a seismic event occurred that rocked potters for yards around. The effects were prolonged and could be felt in some potter’s dreams several hours later. When interviewed witnesses stated that they first saw notorious pottery collector and fine artist Juana Gnecco sipping her morning coffee from this devastatingly beautiful mug, which she later claimed she had brought with her from her private collection. Surrounding potters were left shaken. It may take weeks for them to recover, or as long as shipping from Filmore Indiana takes, at least.
Here’s my friend and 36 year veteran of collecting Athens area pottery Theresa inspecting the cause of this seismic event:
Cause some tremors in your own world by visiting St Earth Pottery and laying claim to your own little seismic event:
http://www.negentropic.com/clay/gallery/wood-salt02.shtml
Here is the one I added to my own Quake zone (the one on the left!):
[Wayne's World-style deep bowing]
I’m not worthy!
Oh contraire mon ami……
Seriously, this is really cool. And humbling. It made my morning yesterday.
It made me think about how we send our clay babies (as Geo. Ohr put it) out into the world, and so rarely get to see them in action like this, or hear back about how they’re received by people. That’s so great!
And it’d be pretty hard to put a value on a couple fellow potters admiring one of my pots, or how cool it is to have made my own little aesthetic dent in a place as sweet to my imagination as Athens, GA.
Yeah, even hearing one story of how my pots are being appreciated and lived with is enough to wipe out all the cynicism I ordinarily surround myself with. Creativity DOES make a difference, what we do does have meaning. Maybe not on a global scale, but quiet beauty and humble everyday circumstances are important in their own right. We lose sight of that when we focus on the limelight, the prestige, or on the dollar signs in front of our eyes. An important lesson that I all too easily forget and need to relearn at almost every turn….
Just saw this quote posted this morning:
“A writer out of loneliness is trying to communicate like a distant star sending signals. He isn’t telling, or teaching, or ordering. Rather, he seeks to establish a relationship with meaning, of feeling, of observing. We are lonesome animals. We spend all our lives trying to be less lonesome. And one of our ancient methods is to tell a story, begging the listener to say, and to feel, ‘Yes, that’s the way it is, or at least that’s the way I feel it. You’re not as alone as you thought.’ To finish is sadness to a writer, a little death. He puts the last word down and it is done. But it isn’t really done. The story goes on and leaves the writer behind, for no story is ever done.”
–John Steinbeck
A quote for a quote; one I’ve been saving up to use in a post some day:
“There are moments, rare and powerful, in which a writer, long vanished, seems to stand in your presence and speak to you directly, as if he bore a message meant for you above all others.” – Stephen Greenblatt