Yesterday I placed this video on instagram, of a recently completed pot (at the building stage, before firing and glazing)
and someone questioned whether it was really finished - it has not been smoothed, scraped, refined, in any way other than by fingertips.
This is something intrinsic to the way I work - I would no more wish to remove my fingerprints or stroke marks from the surface of the pot than I would wish to go and sand down the irregularities on the rock formations on Hen Cloud.
This pot is not designed before making, rather I begin to make with a certain direction in mind, and then a creative tension arises and is resolved during the process of making itself, it is a natural unfolding.
This authentic surface of the pot, with its irregularities and dimples, also affects the application of glazes and oxides, creating its own look and feel
There is no absolute "that works" or "that doesn't work". I recently put another coat of glaze and refired a group of pots which I'd made 11 years earlier - and felt very satisfied with the result, even though there had been "nothing wrong" with these pots beforehand - simply I felt there was a greater potential, and in this case, in some sense, I feel that it worked out.
Once a pot emerges from the kiln, it has its own life, its own existence - but still as maker I can interact with it until it goes out into the world, to an exhibition, a gallery, a new home.
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