Who needs sleep, right?
Plus, you'll be keeping me in clay and glaze. And electrical. And tools...
The Third Annual Artist Open House is now DONE! There was so much to get done beforehand. I was out of town the weekend before, and of course, there's my job and general life stuff. It all makes those 24 hours jam-packed, and getting ready for an open house a little more stressful, this year.
Of course, prepping for it involves cleaning, organizing, moving around all the tools and various minutiae I use to make stuff, and washing down the patio area. I wear a mask to sweep up because of the clay dust floating around, but the rest has to be washed down with water, which I hate to do in drought-ridden So. Cal. But needs must, as they say!
Yes, being a potter is all glamor.
Since this open house is a showcase for all my creations, pottery and jewelry and whatnot, it takes a while to put everything in the point of sale (putting on the bar codes, pricing, pics, etc.), and then physically getting the tables set up, the linens put on, shelving and unpacking everything, setting it out in the shelves and on the tables.
It takes time. Walking 300 flyers around for days before the event takes a bunch of time. Designing said flyers takes time. Designing the email announcement, too. I'm not complaining, by the way! It's just part of the deal, and I really enjoy the end result, which is people coming over and enjoying my creepy cute creations!
A little bit at a time, though, things come together! Bin by bin, things get unpacked and arranged.
And then, the start time comes and people walk through the gate and start piling your creations on your checkout table and start asking if you take commissions...
And people start asking about skeleton wind chimes and this and that. And you know you're going to stick with making ceramics.
Because even though people keep telling you, you can't make a living at it (they're mostly right), you get to the point where you understand in your bones that just because something can't be "acceptably" monetized, that doesn't make it worthless, valueless.
The smiles, the happiness. That makes it worth more than money, always.
I feel sorry for people who can't see that.
I've tried to maintain a mix of whimsy and creepiness, probably a leftover of my memories of those Hallowe'ens of the 1970's, largely thought to be the "golden age" of Hallowe'en. We had had the Universal Monsters for years and years, we had those horrors of the 1950's and the Addams Family and the Munsters from the 1960's. In the 1970's and 1980's, we got our horror hosts, and waited eagerly for Zacherle or Elvira to stalk (or slink, in Elvira's case!) across the screen and show us our movie of the week.
Mixed in there was the artistic aesthetic of the 1920's and 30's Hallowe'en retailers who released The Bogie Book and other catalogues like it. Beistle was releasing wonderful die-cuts, which some people were smart enough to keep so future collectors could enjoy them.
I've been doing this for a while now, and while my intent was never to get rich, I've enjoyed a small measure of success. More so now that I'm officially back from an unwanted and forced five-year hiatus from the Hallowe'en folk art circuit.
While the location of what's come to be known as, "The Annual Mugshot" has changed, my love for making these critters has not! Someone suggested I'd get tired of carving jack-o'-lanterns at some point and move on to other things, but that hasn't happened, yet. I still love them, and the joy people have in the jacks they purchase from me keeps me making them.
After all, jack-o'-lanterns are meant to ward off evil spirits, and we definitely want that protection when the veil between the worlds is at its thinnest!
Meanwhile, I've added functional ceramics into the mix, changing up the style a little here and there as new glazes get added to my palette and new ideas surface.
Some are pop-culture inspired, some are things I'd imagine in some witch's apothecary, holding spell components.
This jar is a little Zen. Curses on one side, Blessings on the other. They're always a mixed bag, aren't they?
Some things are just a fun way to get that all-important spell component - caffeine - into your system with a little style...
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