Fly Forward

I've never had my hands in clay before the beginning of this year.  It's a fluke that it even started this year!  For my BFA, I have to have 8 classes of art electives on top of my concentration and minor.  The only class I could take that fit my schedule was a class called "Handbuilding"....what???  Is......That?????  O well; I signed up for it, having no idea what I'd be doing.  I was, quite frankly, scared of clay.  I think I must have attempted something in elementary school that must have bombed.  I don't remember anything like that in particular, but I seemed to have some sort of aversion to the material.  In fact, the first day of class, I didn't go to my clay class right off.  I decided to show up in the printmaking class and see if perhaps they had space for me.  They did not.  I showed up 5 minutes late to clay and luckily, she didn't give my space away.  I had no idea what was waiting for me.  The moment I got my hands in the clay, a new romance was born.  I fell in love; I was enamored with this earthy, elastic piece of heaven.  Each class period was three hours long, but it felt like 20 minutes.  For those three hours, I would lose myself in daydreams, thoughts, the way the clay felt in my hands.  I had all kinds of conversations with that clay.  I poured my frustrations, my passions, my affections and everything else into the process of making something with it.  In the process of being introduced to a new medium, I was also doing some Ignatian exercises in a group setting (Ignatius of Loyola, an ancient of the faith) with Renee Farkas who is a spiritual director here in Franklin who does wonderful work (check her out at Ambernest.com).  My experience with clay converged with this passage in the Ignatian work I was doing: Jeremiah 18:1-6 - "The word that came to Jeremiah from the Lord: 'Arise, and go down to the potter's house, and there I will let you hear my words.'  So I went down to the potter's house, and there he was working at his wheel.  And the vessel he was making of clay was spoiled in the potter's hand, and he reworked it into another vessel, as it seemed good to the potter to do.  Then the word of the Lord came to me: 'O house of Israel, can I not do with you as this potter has done?' declares the Lord.  'Behold, like the clay in the potter's hand, so are you in my hand, O house of Israel.'

I'd read that before, but having a new experience with clay, it caught my attention as it hadn't before.  Clay is unpredictable.  To work in clay, one must be patient and steady.  You can't have a finished piece overnight.  It is slow, steady and I was told early on not to get attached to any of my pieces.  Somewhere in the process, whether during the construction or the firing, you can easily lose the structure or it could turn into something completely different than planned.  I found this to be very true.  I found that if I could keep the process open as long as possible, there was space for more possibility.  Often, I'd throw something back into the slurry to reform and rework something.  Making things out of clay began to be something of a co-creation.  As I intuitively listened to what the clay wanted, we worked together to make it something it wanted to be.  I think that is a lot of what God hopes for us; that we co-create as we converse and walk together, mutually listening, as in any relationship.  Unlike me, God's artistry is perfect.  He doesn't make mistakes in His creative process.  He takes discarded, broken vessels marred by the Fall and reworks, rearranges and re-forms them back to something that is beautiful.  Working with clay facilitates my awareness of God's creative process in me, around me and in the world.  As much as I love the clay, I see that He loves being in my life, touching and whispering and fashioning beauty all around and in the midst of the chaos.  It has been a sacred place for me this semester; a new way to see God and a new way to draw near.  Ironically, after trying to bow out of my first clay class, I will minor in it.  The Fall starts throwing with the potter's wheel!!!  Yipppeeee!!!

Raku Clay Handbuilt Pinchpot (1 of 7)