My hand, protected by a thick leather glove, pulls a brick from the kiln wall; ferocious flames blaze out immediately. Three silhouettes dance between the flames. The clay burns hot, incandescent: white, red, and yellow. The face of a beautiful Amazon warrior seems to look at me, her crown shining even brighter. Their smiles strike me as I step back from the wall. The heat is so intense that one can only stay to watch for a few seconds. The brick goes back to close the wall. The freshness of the night surrounds me. I have chills from the cold breeze and from this incredible first wood fire kiln experience in November 2023. Surprisingly excited by this infernal view. Surprisingly worried about the potential outcome. Everything could melt. Everything could crack or explode. But also — everything could go right, and I will start to see the colors and textures I’ve seen in books and museums. 

This moment illustrates the intensity of my passion for pottery. I consider myself a beginner with limited experience, as I started in late 2019. My family and friends might disagree, but this is also an exciting stage, and I think I’ll always see myself as a beginner. There is so much to learn and experiment with. I know that the flame of this passion will keep burning inside me. It brings me joy; it brings me peace, and it brings me back to who I am. Pottery is my catharsis. 

When I agreed to write this piece, I felt honored to appear in Half-Light. I didn’t want to make it about me; I was excited to share my passion for pottery. There are hundreds of books about pottery, but I realized I could describe pottery and its cathartic effect as it relates to me. I’ll try to avoid making generic statements about art, artists, and creativity. Instead, I want to share how I feel about pottery, how it helped me through complex moments and has become almost as necessary as oxygen. 

Grounding and humbling. Learning from failure.

There are at least three thousand ways to break and ruin a piece of artwork you’re working on during many stages of the creative process. I am sure this is true for all artists — I have seen an experienced glass blower drop a gorgeous, almost-finished glass creation still hot at the tip of the blowing cane. In a second, it was over. 

I enjoy creating things. Since I was a kid, I’ve loved using whatever materials I found to make stuff. Collecting wood from the forest and carving it with an old pocketknife. Folding a piece of paper into a crane or 30 pieces into a 3-D star. Bending and knitting electrical copper wires and sewing strings into a dream catcher. However, in pottery, more than in other forms of creation, we are required to get detached from the object we are trying to create. The material is so fragile and unpredictable. Clay easily collapses when thrown on a wheel, cracks when drying, and warps when being manipulated. The process is highly complex, too. Glazes don’t look the way we wanted them to or the way they used to a couple of weeks earlier. Items can easily explode, change, and melt: everything can change in the kiln. 

I learned so much about failure and how to detach myself from my artwork pieces and the end result. There is an incredible beauty and lesson in accepting the fragility of the materials, accepting to be vulnerable through the process and in front of others looking at what you created. It’s not unlike lessons of intentional detachment in Buddhism. 

You might be thinking — if the end product and people’s perception don’t matter, why bother with it at all? Well, I think it does matter, actually, but it’s not the main objective. The journey and the process matter far more than the result. Failure is a great way to learn. There are many lessons to be learned in not achieving success, a space for improvement and change. I believe that people who succeed too quickly don’t get the chance to learn from their failures. I would be lying if I said I don’t feel happy when I manage to do something that matches my expectations, but I also feel way happier once I manage to create a shape that I attempted to do several times before. 

I also find satisfaction in trying hard for the sake of trying, giving my best effort, and not feeling regret about what I did. Beyond the required practice and technical skills, it brings me joy to be able to push my limits. Who knew that a beautiful drawing made of a certain slip would not remain on the surface of a vase if the contraction ratio of both clays was not the same? Who knew that you could add wallpaper glue powder before drawing? I didn’t. I do now. But the attempt was great; I enjoyed the practice, and I am thankful for the learning opportunity. 

Focusing and meditating 

After some practice, I realized that when I throw a piece on the wheel (yes, that’s the right terminology), i.e., when I make a round-shaped object using the wheel, I usually don’t have other thoughts and feel fully focused on the exercise. I can only imagine this is the same for other artists and athletes when they’re completely consumed by the task at hand. I can shut out the noise from the outside, but also the noise on the inside. All my energy is dedicated to the craft… and making sure the clay does not collapse horribly. 

The type of pottery I practice is displayed in this photo. I carve wooden tools to create simple shapes (square, triangle, lines, rectangles, etc.) and apply these onto the surface of the clay to create a pattern. 

Most objects, when fully decorated, require between 1000 to 3000 applications of tools. Each shape is very simple, but put together, they create interesting patterns and designs. 

As you can imagine, this takes time and is quite repetitive. But I enjoy the repetition; it helps me focus and concentrate even more.  

I run through a standard routine. I sit down and use a pillow to manipulate the pottery creation. I delicately polish the clay with a soft stone to close its pores. I check the consistency and texture of the clay. I draw a single line that sets where the design starts. I press each wooden tool on the clay, each tool in the right succession, creating a canvas for an eye-catching, complex design. 

During this process, I get into a meditative state. The simple but repetitive task drives me to a calmer and meditative state. When I’m done with a pattern, I often realize that I have spent several hours in one piece without moving or feeling the time go by. The noise inside me calms down. In 2022, I went through an emotionally difficult time, and pottery helped me soothe some of these emotions to help avoid feeling overwhelmed and crushed. Most guided meditation methods focus on breathing. Pottery, like other forms of art, helps you get inside your body, deep inside, while observing the change in the clay. Thoughts passing by and being observed are respected and then let go.