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Finding chemistry in clay, metal and leather |
A conversation between Sean Kingsley & Jayne Wallace
Jayne: We were talking yesterday about the power of clay
Sean: You mean the accessibility of it, yeah
J: I guess on this visit, through clay we’ve had the most conversations with people who we can’t speak the same language as us
S: Yeah, well I mean that’s interesting because, I mean you as a jeweller had that experience of speaking to the metal guy and we as a ceramicist speaking to the clay people – well both of us obviously – do you think there was a difference? In the conversations?
J: Yeah definitely, hmm, I think in that metal village it felt quite… well I didn’t get to show them what I can do, I just got to show them things that I had made that I was wearing, but through doing that experienced something similar to you, but I think there was a very different dynamic – because it had already been set up that we were coming and they knew Vineeta it was different to us just rocking up in a village – there were certain assumptions as to why we were there and expectations of us buying stuff, but while we were in the pottery village we were just strangers who had appeared.
S: we did have more people to choose from there as well of course, if we hadn’t have got on with the first folks we could have easily have gone on to the next. As it happened everybody was extremely open and willing to show us what they did and how they did it.
J: You say that, but it wasn’t quite that easy – like the last guy – there they were eating a meal
S: Ha, they were yes, Aye
J: We’re just stood there looking at the finished pots outside his wall, we can’t easily communicate as for that last trip we didn’t have a student with us to help in translation.
S: Yes, Aye
J: But then you started showing him your work on your phone and that’s when the magic happened again. I think there’s something really interesting there. The things that have most stood out to me are how -I think basically you both showed each other that you’ve got mutual respect for each others skills and talent.
S: Yeah
J: And listening to Neelima (Hasija) in ceramics here at NID the other day usually it’s people from a lower caste
S: yes
J: who would do ceramics, erm, there was something there – there was a kind of bond – it wasn’t just… well it shifted from being a patron wanting to buy something, appreciating the goods that they’ve made to more like what happened when you were talking to another potter in the village earlier in the week where you called yourselves Mati Bhai (clay brothers)
S: Yeah, that’s right yeah
J: And I thought that was really powerful
S: Yeah, and it wasn’t just westerners coming in as well, all that sort of thing, trying to buy tourist objects you know. Of course they were all wholesalers as well weren’t they, which I think is important as well, they’re not generally selling to the public direct, so we were probably fairly unusual I think
J: I think every time you’ve showed your pictures of your work, something similar to that has happened – there has definitely been this kind of ‘Oh! You’re one of us!’
S: Yeah, that’s right, yeah
J: And I don’t you can underestimate the power of that
S: yeah, I mean that’s been a great insight hasn’t it
J: I’d say that the experience with the leather, rather than us just going into the shop and saying we’d like to buy what they have, the actual prototyping and making and us showing the leather things that we’ve already made and me showing them the bag I had made and working out a pattern for them in paper there was a sense of them seeing us as makers like them.
S: That’s right, yeah – that we understand the process like they do
J: It’s like a different kind of communication isn’t it
S: Yeah it’s a common language isn’t it – making – and going through the process of making is a way of thinking
J: yeah, and maybe what we found through our several trips and many hours with the guys in the leather shop (probably more than with the clay or metal makers) – well if we think about it the making that we did in the clay village was minimal, but a way that you became clay brothers with them – but with the leather guys making and prototyping together made an environment where we could just be there comfortably through quite a slow process
S: That’s right, actually we have got three quite interesting case studies, shall we say, because both of us were in places that were our core skills then the third place which wasn’t (leather) which means our skills and understanding of making sort of worked fine in the leather place even though it wasn’t our material – that is quite interesting that
J: Irini said something interesting yesterday when we’d left the leather place, (because we’d had hugs with the makers and photos on our cameras and theirs and they’d wanted to take photographs of us with the things they had made for us) she said we have to work with them – we have to do a project with them because there’s clearly chemistry
S: Absolutely! I think that’s what you were getting at at breakfast wasn’t it – that you need people there, you know – sending a file of what you would like them to make isn’t the same – it’s all about the chemistry you build up with people that leads to the most interesting creative collaborations
J: And that’s the huge challenge for the IoT in this space!
S: Aye
J: How can you maintain the chemistry through digital means when we’re not here in India? I mean how could you maintain being a ‘clay brother’ with makers in the pottery village if you collaborated with them when you’re back home through IoT? It’s not that it’s impossible I suppose, but it’s a big question. It’s not about channels of communication and sending data, whether through drawings or specifying dimensions, it’s them getting to know us and our aesthetics through the things we make and finding joint shared aesthetics in pieces we’re making together – you know like in the leather shop starting with a first prototype for a bag where they had sewn a seam with leather cord spiralling around the outer edge, to us refining how things were stitched with leather cord – to then them suggesting fine bright pink thread stitching to complement a pale coloured leather bag!
S: (laughs)