Anyone who knows me and ceramics, knows I am basically a sculptor at heart. Unfortunately, in order to learn the smokefiring side of things, this has necessitated throwing large numbers of pots which can be sacrificed to that learning process. There would be very little learning and a lot of heartache if only a few carefully handbuilt pieces had been smokefired up to now. Anyway, as the stock in the studio has been built up, I decided to take a week out to have some handbuilding fun. These were the result. Unfortunately, the smokefiring wasn't brilliant on these. They deserved better. I am also not entirely satisfied with the form so I am going away to mull over how to improve them.

Fundamentally, I have always liked the idea of something appearing to be something that it is not. So in this case, the objects appear solid, whereas they are hollow and therefore lighter than expected to hold. Its a continuing theme I keep coming back to. As sighted humans, we should be forced to go round for part of the day with a blindfold on. Our brain and our eyes have an ongoing conspiracy - like a possessive friendship - which operates to exclude all the other senses. Its only if we close our eyes that our brain starts listening properly to all the other senses - of touch, smell and hearing. If you can use all of these in the same measure as the eyes, you will find the world around you a richer place.