Dear Santa,

OO

Things I want for Christmas

1. Gift Certificate from THE MAD POTTER!
2. Sherrill Ribs from THE MAD POTTER!

3. A Giffin Grip from THE MAD POTTER!
4. Anything from THE MAD POTTER!

From your favourite well behaved Potter

THE MAD POTTER

#6 - 3071 No. 5 Road, Richmond ~ Tel: 604.244.3734

Pottery and the Uninitiated

“What were you looking at?” asked my musician friend as we left a
potter’s studio on the Culture Crawl last month. It’s a simple, yet loaded
question about pots, and what it’s like to view them from the perspective
of a potter, compared to the uninitiated.

I imagine it must appear somewhat absurd to a non-potter,
following a potter through a room full of pots: we pick things up,
for starters (“Are you allowed to touch that?” a non-potting friend
will ask me.) Not only do we pick things up to gauge the heft and
balance of a piece in our hands, but we turn the pot over and examine
the bottom—the dead-gtveaway move that signals to any other potter
that you’re a peer—and makes you look quite strange to just about
anyone else!

This debate has come up before with
my musician friend: as someone who 1s
initiated into the language and processes
of a craft—be it music or pots—do we
have a different experience of our craft
than someone uninitiated?

I don’t read music. I sing, but don’t
play an instrument. I can’t imagine what
would be involved in writing a song from
nothing, because my mind 1s not trained
to think or create in that medium. I love
music—and I appreciate with more than
a little awe those gifted (and disciplined)

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—*7° rrr rrr