I’m carefully unloading the kiln, holding a tray, and filling it with new, delicate, glazed, and shiny ceramic pieces. I’m thrilled, like any time that I’m pleased with ready new works. The tray is full of ceramic pieces, I’m turning to place it on my working table, one wrong movement, and everything falls and crashes on the floor, F*****ck.
This scene did happen to me, maybe once or twice in this big-scale disaster. But things break all the time in the studio. I’m working with clay, and it is fragile and gentle material, and shit happens when you are working with clay.
As a ceramic designer for the last 17 years, I do not get over-excited or frustrated when something breaks. I got used to it, and it’s part of the process. You get used to different catastrophes with clay when it cracks, damages, or bumps into something, when the glaze drips, and when the piece is too thin or thick.
2.
One of my favorite things, when a greenware piece (not baked) is damaged, is to smash it into the recycle bin. Throw it, break it, or crush it with my hands.
Pablo Picasso once said, “The urge to destroy is also a creative urge. “(This was originally written by anarchist philosopher Mikhail Bakunin in his essay “Reaction in Germany,” in 1842.)
We have this primal urge to break things; it gives us satisfaction in a strange way, whether by mistake or intentionally. Many artists are familiar with that feeling of frustration when something is not working out as planned, anger is raging, and all they want to do is destroy the piece they have been working on. So many times, our creations and artwork reflect our minds and thoughts. When we are angry or frustrated and trying to get rid of this irritation, we prefer to destroy this creation that reflects ourselves and release the tension by destroying what we created.
A creative urge is about needing to do something now, create, express a desire, something that we feel that we must do.
Is the urge to destroy working on the exact needs? We destroy to create; we destroy from curiosity, from the need to express ourselves.
A creative urge is making something out of nothing, but is making nothing out of something is it also a creative act/urge?
3.
As a Ceramics, you learn to be patient, and most importantly, you know how to deal with broken pieces, disappointments, setbacks, and catastrophes in the studio. You take a deep breath, learn from your mistakes and start again.
As a Creative Coach, I learned to make room for disappointment and sadness, accept and embrace what just happened, and understand that things like this will happen again.
In life, We can’t be in control all the time, and unpleasant things happen everywhere. In life, like in the studio, things break. So you can take a deep breath, give room for your feelings, disappointment, or sadness, and learn from them.
4.
In a performance art piece, in 2001, The artist Michael Landy destroyed everything he owned. he did it in public, after creating a catalog of his belonging of 7,227 items. For two weeks, he shredded, crushed, dismantled, and destroyed every piece he owned with the help of 12 assistants while listening to David Bowie and Joy Division.
“It was the happiest two weeks of my life,” he said.
His performance was about consumerism, the relationships people have with their belonging, what they possess and desire, and where we are heading as a society.
He said he got a lot of satisfaction and liberation from destroying all his belongings.
Some thoughts about the urge to break
1.
I’m carefully unloading the kiln, holding a tray, and filling it with new, delicate, glazed, and shiny ceramic pieces. I’m thrilled, like any time that I’m pleased with ready new works. The tray is full of ceramic pieces, I’m turning to place it on my working table, one wrong movement, and everything falls and crashes on the floor, F*****ck.
This scene did happen to me, maybe once or twice in this big-scale disaster. But things break all the time in the studio. I’m working with clay, and it is fragile and gentle material, and shit happens when you are working with clay.
As a ceramic designer for the last 17 years, I do not get over-excited or frustrated when something breaks. I got used to it, and it’s part of the process. You get used to different catastrophes with clay when it cracks, damages, or bumps into something, when the glaze drips, and when the piece is too thin or thick.
2.
One of my favorite things, when a greenware piece (not baked) is damaged, is to smash it into the recycle bin. Throw it, break it, or crush it with my hands.
Pablo Picasso once said, “The urge to destroy is also a creative urge. “(This was originally written by anarchist philosopher Mikhail Bakunin in his essay “Reaction in Germany,” in 1842.)
We have this primal urge to break things; it gives us satisfaction in a strange way, whether by mistake or intentionally. Many artists are familiar with that feeling of frustration when something is not working out as planned, anger is raging, and all they want to do is destroy the piece they have been working on. So many times, our creations and artwork reflect our minds and thoughts. When we are angry or frustrated and trying to get rid of this irritation, we prefer to destroy this creation that reflects ourselves and release the tension by destroying what we created.
A creative urge is about needing to do something now, create, express a desire, something that we feel that we must do.
Is the urge to destroy working on the exact needs? We destroy to create; we destroy from curiosity, from the need to express ourselves.
A creative urge is making something out of nothing, but is making nothing out of something is it also a creative act/urge?
3.
As a Ceramics, you learn to be patient, and most importantly, you know how to deal with broken pieces, disappointments, setbacks, and catastrophes in the studio. You take a deep breath, learn from your mistakes and start again.
As a Creative Coach, I learned to make room for disappointment and sadness, accept and embrace what just happened, and understand that things like this will happen again.
In life, We can’t be in control all the time, and unpleasant things happen everywhere. In life, like in the studio, things break. So you can take a deep breath, give room for your feelings, disappointment, or sadness, and learn from them.
4.
In a performance art piece, in 2001, The artist Michael Landy destroyed everything he owned. he did it in public, after creating a catalog of his belonging of 7,227 items. For two weeks, he shredded, crushed, dismantled, and destroyed every piece he owned with the help of 12 assistants while listening to David Bowie and Joy Division.
“It was the happiest two weeks of my life,” he said.
His performance was about consumerism, the relationships people have with their belonging, what they possess and desire, and where we are heading as a society.
He said he got a lot of satisfaction and liberation from destroying all his belongings.
Creating nothing out of something.