Emily Lees
My way to clay has been long and winding, with many stops along the way. When I was nineteen, I visited Teague Pottery in Seagrove, NC, where a potter who was demonstrating the potter’s wheel asked me if I would like to try my hand at it. I replied yes, and the minute my hands touched the spinning clay, I knew that I would be a potter. College, graduate school, and marriage all intervened, however, and it was seven years before I took my first clay class. Another hiatus followed while I worked and raised a family. A quarter of a century later, I again embarked on the route of becoming a potter.
My current pottery is handbuilt from slabs. The idea of containment is central to my work. My flat vase forms, or flounders, create interplay between two and three dimensions. I put square plates on feet or pedestals to suggest that their contents are being offered to the viewer. Bottles conversely both hide and suggest content. Circles continue the notion of containment, while rectangles imply doorways allowing the viewer to enter, or sometimes to pass through.
I do both Raku and cone 6 oxidation firings. The nineteenth century Japanese aesthetic found in ukiyo-e woodblock prints informs my craft. I strive, too, to pay homage to the essence of mingei, or traditional Japanese folk art pottery. I interpret Asian forms in red and yellow Raku glazes, and my stoneware reflects the same influences in a more muted palette. Alternately, the geometric lines which sometimes appear in my work are evocative of Piet Mondrian’s paintings. Working with clay is a meditation and a joy. I hope that people who view my work will likewise derive pleasure from my art.
