Extreme Craft

Handmade for Japan

It's hard to put the gravity of the situation in Japan into words. Otsuchi, which is the sister city of Fort Bragg (a nearby California town), was completely destroyed in the tsunami that followed the earthquake. Our campus and the nearby communities are raising money through the website Otsuchi.org. There are tons of craft and art-based benefits going on to benefit the relief effort, but I wanted to highlight Handmade for Japan, which was organized by potter Ayumi Horie (who organized the Obamaware benefit a couple of years ago).

The benefit, which takes the shape of a 4-day eBay auction, features heavy-hitters from the ceramics world including Betty Woodman, Jun Kaneko...and even a small iron-glazed vase from legendary Japanese potter Hamada Shoji (who passed away in 1978). There are also prints and drawings in the auction--including drawings from Nancy Blum and Lisa Congdon.

All profits from the sale will go to GlobalGiving's relief efforts in Japan. Hurry! The auctions will end on Sunday, March 27th at 8:00 pm EST.

LINK thanks Ayumi!

Feats of Clay

If all of my digging through ceramics magazines has taught me anything.... it's that they don't make ceramics world fuckery like they used to. Back in the '70s, ceramic artists may have been a bunch of cavemen who tended toward misogyny (and perhaps alcoholism), but they had a sense of humor, dammit! At some point, I'll cover some of Clayton Bailey's wacky performances at clay world events, but I think I might have just discovered my favorite conceptual ceramics piece of all time.

I was totally excited to get an email from Rimas VisGirda, a legendary ceramic artist (who I'm certainly not accusing of being a drunk misogynistic ceramic caveman). He saw one of my previous posts on Ceramics Monthly ads featuring mustachioed gentlemen throwing gigantic pots, and clued me into his "Captain Ceramics" project, which started in 1977.

From what I've been able to glean from Rimas and a brief Ceramics Monthly article, Captain Ceramics was Rimas' alter ego--the helm of a massive '70s ceramic enterprise that set its sights on crushing every other hobby-world ceramics business on the face of the planet. '70s ceramics ads were heavy on pretty ladies and machismo (and for the most part, they still do). The above postcard image shows the patented "Captain Ceramic" splashguard, which was guaranteed to keep dirty ol' clay off one's go-go boots or fishnet stockings.

The piece de resistance was a potter's wheel called the X-1 that was powered by a 300-horsepower V-8 engine from a 1965 Oldsmobile (pictured at the top of this post). The X-1 wasn't their only potter's wheel innovation--they also sold a wheel they claimed was the world's "least powerful". The "Home Hobby Potter's Wheel" was a portable metal plate and spindle that was powered by a pull-string.

Captain Ceramics also carried specialty products like pre-centered balls of clay and pre-thrown cylinders for the lazy (or simply wheel-challenged like me) people. I've started to see some young folks out there who are creating ceramic performance pieces. This is incredibly exciting--but I challenge them to push themselves to ever-crazier feats of ceramic weirdness. They have a long way to go before they can go toe-to-toe with Captain Ceramics.

Stay tuned! I'm hoping I can have some more Captain Ceramics surprises for you in the coming weeks!

No Fly Zone

It had to happen sooner or later. I've been walking around and traveling for a few years with a laptop bag that my wife made that proudly displays the Extreme Craft logo. I've been nervously looking over my shoulder at the airport screening line, but I've never had a problem.

Apparently, some of the airport screeners in Amsterdam are a liiiiiiiiiiittle paranoid. Maybe a side effect of the national "medicine". I got this Facebook message from my friend Jeff today:

"Garth--I thought you would enjoy to know that I was informed by airport security in amsterdam that I may be detained / arrested for displaying the extreme craft sticker on my luggage.  Did you know that Extreme Craft can be too extreme?"

Damn. I've gotta fly to Tampa for the NCECA conference next week. Somebody will be letting you know if I end up in Guantanamo.