Praying in the Shadows
Stands a heron with a Bible and a knife
Don’t ever know
But basically we’re going to die
Everything is ok a little unstable
I have blood on both hands
But I do not know where I fell
(Spinvis, translated dutch lyrics “In staat van Narcose”, 2002)
The text is sinister and inspiring, I saw inner images. A heron, a preacher with a long dark cowl, armed as in the Wild West. Immovable, concealed against rain and wind at the side of a ditch.
He rides out the storm, passive, stoically, mumbling an unarticulate prayer. Woe the unsuspecting fish swimming by. Higher powers justify its sheded blood…
From inspiration to creation
Through clay and glazes I want to make my inner images tangible. Where inspiration starts and when it turns into perspiration I find hard to say. I find inspiration in the history of ceramics, in the natural raw materials and the underlying chemical processes.
Traditional hand-formed ceramics I find fascinating. Forms that have been developed and crystallized over the centuries. Use, symbolism and aesthetics in equilibrium. A language, within the laws of culture, function, engineering and chemistry. With this old language I want to shape contemporary images.
Spinvis
I work with thrown shapes of the wheel. I pull handles and assemble, not to make functional ceramics like a jug, but an image, a heron. The lyrics of Erik de Jong (Spinvis) inspired me to elaborate this form further. I wanted to visualize the symbolism of a bible and a knife. A conviction and a desire to impose this by force. Current in the past and present. Frightening and intriguing.
And what about the heron, is he really that terrifying? No of course not, only the people who resemble herons…
Previously published in Klei keramiek magazine (Clay Ceramics Magazine) 2018-4
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