Bob Smith

Idledale, Colorado, USA

Title: Vase Form

Year of Creation: 2008

Glaze: White crackle raku glaze with ferric chloride

Clay Body: 2002 Raku Clay Body

Dimensions: Height 26.5 inches, Width 10 inches

Artist's Statement: Silhouette and form, with a quiet contained presence, have always been my major concerns. My most current work reflects this ongoing fascination with form, plus an increased exploration of greater depth, subtlety and drama in the surface, with new directions in color, scale and texture. I continue to use the vessel as my point of departure, enjoying the historical connection. But more and more, it is what I do to the piece after it comes from the kiln -- airbrushing, specifically applied combustibles, controlled water and air-quenching -- that dominates my thinking.

I often think I make pots to slow down the world; and maybe to experience the sensual/tactile quality of wet clay on the wheel; and maybe to better understand life's dichotomies and paradoxes by studying clay's dichotomies and paradoxes -- the microcosm of the studio and macrocosm of the world; and maybe just because I have to.