Wednesday, August 15, 2012

Lexington, KY or Bust


I will be Kentuky bound in 9 weeks to attend a Potters Council workshop. My buddy Susan and I are going to fly to Ontario (either Kitchener Waterloo, or London) to meet up with her friend Jan and then all 3 of us will be driving down to the Bluegrass State for a little fun with mud. There won't be any hands on, but there will be 6 different presenters, over 2 days, discussing and sharing their work and methods. The workshop is titled “The Ceramic Voice: Narrative Works in Clay”. From my experience with these types of events, the title usually is not always relevant. The last one I attended was called “Surfacing” and dealt with the things potters/artitst do to add texture, colour, etc to the surface of their work. However, there were artists there, ie: Mark Hewitt, who did not really focus on that at all. Mark threw a couple really large vessels, and talked about his life, kilns, methods, etc, but the “surface” part was not the main focus. I am just looking forward to seeing how different people approach the medium, what influences them etc. There will be a pottery exchange on the last day, so that should be cool too.

We even managed to get free accommodation. Susan's husband travels a lot for his work and has donated the points necessary for us to get a room for 3 nights for FREE. I like FREE. My only other expense after flights and the workshop fee will be the gas for the trip. Not sure how much that will be, but split 3 ways, it shouldn't be too horrific, especially since gas is much much cheaper in the US compared to Canada.

Usually when I go on a road trip, it involves the rocky mountains that hog the sky. This will be a newish experience for me. The eastern states in late October should be beautiful. I am thinking flaming fall colours, not the yellow poplar that quickly turns to brown out here, but real “fall” colours. You never know though, when I was in NY in early October it was still very very green, so this might be too, but perhaps being farther inland will cool things down? Then there was the heat/drought this year, so it might just be brown. It appears that the average temperature in that area in October is in the 20 C range with lows of 8 C. I guess I will dress for cool, but potentially warm. No bikinis or parkas, but anything in between.

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