"Simple like an uncarved block."
Tao te Ching


"Like an acorn that holds the promise of a thousand forests."

Friday, October 9, 2009

MADE ANY BOWLS LATELY

I had a good time last night at the Ceramic studio of good friend Marilee Hall. I would love for you to click on her name and visit her studio. It is a joy and a delight to visit her while she is working. Last night was an adventure for several of us because we were going to learn to make a bowl out of a slab of clay. We were a crew of volunteer ceramic artists and want-to-be's that are making bowls for the annual Habitat for Humanity fund raiser. There are clay artists and their students all around Cookeville, Tn. also making bowls to fill the need of this very popular event called Cooking on the Square. The donated bowls are sold for $15 each, then the owner carries the vessel to each of the volunteer cooks serving gumbos and other Cajun foods where they receive a helping of that vendors offering. The bowl can be refilled at as many tents as one cares to visit. Bread, drinks and Banana Pudding are also donated and served to the hungry crowd. You take your bowl home and add it to your collection from previous years. I have several soup bowls that serve many uses around the house. Habitat for Humanity does very well and we all have a wonderful time on the last Friday of October.

These were my try at bowl making. A little raw, a little primitive, a lot of prompting from Marilee, but a good feeling of having done something useful and worthwhile.
These are some other bowls waiting to go into the kiln and be glazed, not sure what order. I think fire, glaze and fire again, I should have asked.
The hearts on the lower shelf have been glazed so just imagine the clay above as shinny.

8 comments:

Marcie said...

What a great event! It's very cool that you are a part of it.

Cloudhands said...

This is the first year I have tried making bowls but we always go and enjoy the food. Churches, clubs and families brew up cookers full of good Cajun foods and it is set up in one street by the courthouse. Someone usually hires a cajun band so there is music to listen to while you stroll the tents and chow down.

Marcie said...

It sounds really fun, and of course it is a great cause!

marilee hall said...

Wow, Barb, that was such a nice write up. It is always a warm and fun event when people get together with open hearts to create, and it was great knowing our work would be used to maybe buy a few nails to put roofs over folks' heads.
Thanks so much!
I've just come from the fun Blues and Brews to benefit the public TV station. Great music, old and young danced away!

Cloudhands said...

Hey Marilee,
I think we all had fun learning a new appreciation of what you do all the time. And to think I always thought making a bowl required a throwing wheel or long coils of clay. So it was a delight to see it all from a new point of view. Thanks.

Beth Niquette said...

That sounds like a LOT of fun! I'd love to do something so creative as this. How intresting...I was fascinated!

One Woman's Journey - a journal being written from Woodhaven - her cottage in the woods. said...

What a wonderful idea. You live in such a neat area. Not much goes on here in my little part of the country.

Cloudhands said...

Beth and Ernestine,
Perhaps having Tennessee Tech University in Cookeville has attracted many creative people to the area. I just know that arts, crafts, music and theatre are big draws in this area. We have big events several times a year. I feel very fortunate to live here.