Inspirational breakdown

If there is one thing that every artist dreads but that happens to be inevitable, it’s the lack of inspiration. I’d like to say that in my case this is cyclical; about once a year I have an inspirational blackout.

When this happens to me, no use getting to the studio table and trying to make anything because it’s a loss of time. What I do is run out of the studio and find something different to do that requires all my attention. I need to empty my head of anything concerning clay and the clay environment. This year again I fled the blackout by diving into our corridor renovation: scraping the ugly salmon stucco chosen 20 years ago from the walls, plastering them back, sanding and painting them in a nice neutral soothing color. Redoing the ceiling, painting the doors and cabinet doors and finally retiling the floor to match the rest of the house. In short, an occupation that kept me away from the studio for over 2 months!!!

But every evening, I would surf on the internet and reconnect for a short moment. Every day I enjoyed Melanie West’s posts on world wide artists working in so many different mediums. Her posts are always a great source of inspiration, Thank you Melanie!

This time again it « TILTED » when discovering this creation from a Japanese artist named Jiro Kamata living in Munich.

 

Jiro Kamata

The overlapping pieces, like thrown on top of each other struck me and it has been in the corner of my mind since. So when time came to get back to work, I knew where I was heading to.

Of course it doesn’t come at once. You have to try, try again, improve it, take a new path, digress to start to see it come to life as you had felt it deep inside.

The first try was made of neutral colors and imitations of raw materials. When seing it, my son said it was lacking colors but he liked the faux slate because of the dimension it brought.

Second and third try: color jumps in, but still the feeling it is lacking some punch and volume.


From volume to 3D there was just one step. Add a brilliant and warm color and there you are. It makes sense, it’s nice to look at, the construction issues are settled and I’m off for a mini collection.


 

Of course the need of sizing it down to make matching earrings came and here they are! The earrings are light, comfy so 3 new pairs are in the making.


I don’t know for you, but personally I don’t really fear the inspirational blackout because each time it feels like coming back to life and it’s a wonderful feeling. I just need to find something else to renovate in the house for next time… Gosh I have no idea!!!

For those who might be interested I will be teaching two workshops at Clayathon 2020 in NJ. It’s still time to join in…

 

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