Shaking Things Up!

It’s September and change is in the air: the nights are cool, the light is changing, soon it’ll be the Equinox and we’ll be moving into the darker and more internal time of the year. I always love the changing of the seasons, it makes me feel invigorated like it’s time for me to change too.  Recently, I’ve been taking a look at my studio practice and noticed that I’ve let things slide into the easy and comfortable zone. Well, it’s time to shake things up!

I think somewhere in my upbringing I hooked onto the idea that doing things the hard way was more valuable than doing it the easy way, that the required effort made the result intrinsically better. It’s taken a long time but I think I’ve finally realized that harder might just be harder.
In an attempt to make more new work and better new work, I plan to streamline my process. Maybe I will make groups of things, everything doesn’t have to be one-of-a-kind. After all, a Eucalyptus tree makes thousands of seedpods and while each is slightly different, they are definitely variations on a theme! Maybe it’s time to get the glaze recipes more uniform so they don’t require so much babysitting at firing time. Perhaps a few basic molds will provide starting forms that can then be built on and modified. I’m going to try everything, pay close attention, and try not to get sucked into my old habits.

Now comes the kicker–in an effort to jump start this move, I am committing to making 100 objects in 100 days starting Wednesday, September 14th, and posting one every day on my Instagram feed. Since ceramics requires multiple processes, things will not be totally completed in one day. It would be impossible to get the two firings and glazing done all in one day, but I will build a piece every day and post updates when they are completely done. A hundred days is not so bad, it’s only a little over three months! If you want to keep up with my progress then follow me on Instagram at www.instagram.com/shoshanaparryceramics.