INEVITABLITY

"Just when I thought I was out................they pull me back in". After completing a large number of orders, commissions and pots for several holiday shows, I thought my terra cotta run was at an end, for now. However, it started off innocently enough with an email asking if I could make a covered serving bowl in my Falling Leaves pattern, then my wife says, well, as long as you need to fill the kiln, I could use 4 shallow bowls in the Tenot pattern (carved with white slip). Next thing you know, I am making a few of these, a few of those and I am in the midst of another terra cotta cycle. I am also going to make a few extra Falling Leaves and Tenot pattern pieces just to have some of the newer work around. It never hurts to have spare pots in the works, someone may even want them.

Illustrated in the foreground is a terra cotta hand-built vase with small lugs, it currently measures 14" tall by 12" long. I thought it would make a nice platform to decorate and it was a spur of the moment project though I will likely make another to fit up the back of the kiln. If you look in the background you can see the four bowls that Mindy requested for our cupboard along with the rest of one afternoon's throwing. Considering I have been throwing terra cotta, stoneware and porcelain for nearly two decades, it is rather inevitable that I will be throwing the red menace for some time to come.