When I was finally able to get back into the studio after summer break and the craziness that ensues when school starts back up, I had to gain my bearings. Get my head back on straight. Or at least my studio brain. I decided to take some of my older pieces and rework them. This is one of them. There was a lot of excavating and scraping and revealing of layers. And then I added one of my bowls. There’s something about my bowls that center me. It probably has to do with me associating centering a ball of clay on the wheel when I’ve thrown bowls.
Several of my bowl paintings have to do with rising above the fray, or finding calm in the midst of turmoil. This one followed the same path of meaning.
The title comes from one of my black out poems that I do in a vintage book I found at a used library book sale. I found that this exercise of using a black marker and crossing out words to make a poem is a way of centering myself as well. I find it pretty meditative actually and it’s surprising what ends up appearing.
remind me
what was left
among scattered belongings
of deep talks and walks
that, loving myself
was the outward and visible sign
of dignity
up to that moment
I had completely forgotten
so trivial a matter
remember