I have been cleaning pots from our recent firing in the woodkiln. I sort the stars from the clunkers as we prepare for the Pottery on the Hill show this weekend.Today I got to a point where I could not see anything clearly. I was forgetting what it was to fall in love with a pot. While making dinner I followed a recipe for tofu and delicata squash. As the recipe called for a medium size bowl for the marinade, I reached for a bowl made by Michael Hunt and Naomi Daglish of Bandana Pottery. I remembered falling in love with this warm yellow bowl two years ago. However recently, every time I reach for it the color does not work. Tonight in the gentle evening with the leaves turning color and a hot oven, this pot was the right tone for sesame miso molasses on roasted squash. It was a reminder of how the colors of a food have potential to bring out the best resonance in a bowl.
Louise Allison Cort, curator for ceramics at the Freer Gallery of Art and the Arthur M. Sackler Gallery at the Smithsonian Institution will give lectures on "Pots and People" at 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. Saturday at the Hill Center
"It is important for the lucky people who will buy these pots to complete the transaction by putting the pots to use in their daily lives, not just placing them high on a shelf for display," said Ms. Cort
Persimmons have become a fall firing tradition. Their color, shape and seasonal appearance set the tone as we begin to fill the kiln.
"I have been younger in October
