The Art of Practice

The afternoon light pools softly in the freshly thrown plates, overflowing from one to another as the sun pours the last of its liquid gold over the lip of the horizon. I breathe in the cool air of the studio, rich in the fragrances of earth and wood, and exhale in a long, satisfied sigh. It has been a good day. 

Even after forty-seven years as a potter, I still find joy and revelation in the intimate dance of the clay in my hands as it spins on the wheel, each piece a new and unique expression of that interaction of the elements of nature, universal forces, and the awareness of the human mind. And just as I never tire of the beauty of a sunset, and each ephemeral iteration still takes my breath away, so, too, the life of a potter offers endless joy and inspiration. The evolution of the forms may be subtle, almost imperceptible, but is that not how nature evolves? Is that not how we grow as human beings and mature into our craft, honing our skills with deliberate practice, day by day, step by step, until they are as natural to us as breathing? Only then, when the process is second nature to us, do we truly have freedom of expression, to tell our story with immediacy and spontaneity, unhindered...and then we take a breath, and continue to practice and learn for the whole of our lives.

Mingei is a patient art, as much a work ethic as an aesthetic, rather like agriculture in many ways, and cannot be rushed. It is about us humans as part of the environment, the simple, wholesome beauty of the process and how the resulting harvest will nourish the people we love, our family, our community. Beauty is the natural state of the world, and traditional society evolved with every thing we made and used imbued with that beauty. In an increasingly industrial, technological and artificial society, where we are more and more separated from nature, from each other, from ourselves, it is the task of the artist not to put up another mirror in a maze of mirrors that already surrounds us, but to open a window, or even a door. 

The Mingei artist strives to live and work according to the same principles that were the source of beauty in the everyday functional art of traditional societies. To add their own understanding of the world and give it a form, made by hand with natural materials and conscientious of the user, which they can touch and hold and lift to their lips, and which will enrich their everyday lives, every day.

Sadly, some people just don't get that.