After a few confusing weeks of Minnesota weather, it seems we finally have entered the spring season. The air is getting warmer and the lovely spring colors are vibrant. This month, we chose pottery that reminded us of these spring shades.
Our cobalt glaze is reminiscent of spring showers, the darker shades like the roaring thunderclouds above and the lighter hues like rain.
The Iron glaze is bright and vibrant like the sun which, thankfully, is now shining brightly daily.
Our mixture of glazes for our classic Cosmic Mugs is bright and colorful. Normally, these colors make me think about what they are inspired by, the cosmos. However, with the changing of the seasons, these hues make me think of the brightly colored flowers that will soon be popping out of the ground.
This month 4 lucky winners will win beautiful pottery absolutely free. Hope you enjoy this giveaway and good luck!
Last week, about 2,400 people responded to this Facebook Survey Request/Giveaway. Our goal was to test whether or not people might want a new feature: a low priced, pottery subscription service that gives them a more affordable way to get a Cherrico Pottery cup.
73% of people wanted this! I was super surprised, because subscriptions can be really tricky. None of us need another monthly bill. It’s also a TON of extra work for our team to keep track of subscriptions, to guarantee everything is organized, that pottery gets crafted, packed and shipped in a specific timeline.
But shipping handmade art straight to people’s doorsteps is something special. We’ve gotten better and better over time, and been able to get costs down. Our team has broken only about 3 pots in shipping in the past 3 years– out of about 9,000 total pots!
So today, we’re announcing a HUGE change to our Patreon “Fan Club” subscription service– everyone gets a pot!
Answer: You’re getting lowest possible prices, while helping Cherrico Pottery evolve. Your subscription is a HUGE help for us. It means that we don’t have to worry every month about what pottery we need to craft, kiln fire (while crossing our fingers that the firings go well) and figure out how to sell. More subscribers means that we (Sienna and Joel) can spend more time making art, and far less time selling it. We can spend longer periods of time crafting pots for once yearly mailings as our main support source. Consistent monthly support also let us be more generous with gifts, giveaways and coupons every month. Please consider subscribing here: patreon.com/cherricopottery
QUESTION: “I’m already a Patron. What changes?”
Answer: Nothing! Except that now you are getting at least one bonus piece of pottery mailed to your doorstep at no extra cost, once yearly. View all details in our “Reward Tiers” here: patreon.com/cherricopottery
QUESTION: “Can I still get pottery from your free newsletter if I don’t subscribe?”
Answer: Yep! Patrons will get first pick and consistently better coupons, but lots of great deals will still be available in the free newsletter.
QUESTION: “Can I send you a one-time payment instead?”
Answer: No, sorry. Thank you very much for considering this, though. The best way to do this is to simply buy a piece of pottery, at full price or with coupons, from cosmicmugs.com or store.cherricopottery.com.
It felt like people were simply supporting us out of the kindness of their hearts, because they loved watching the Facebook videos so much– and it also felt like a success. Our initial 200 supporter goal was reached in just a few months.
But somehow, it always comes back to the pots. People kept telling us that what they really wanted was pottery– not just to watch it being made, but to use and enjoy it in their homes.
“Art: that’s what we call it when a human being makes something, something that might not work, something generous, something important. That’s what art is.”
Thirty-four years ago, astronomer and Cosmos host Carl Sagan made his famous claim:
“If you wish to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first invent the universe.” – Carl Sagan. “The Lives of the Stars.” Cosmos: A Personal Voyage. PBS. 1980.
Sagan could have been talking about making anything from scratch. His goal was to convey that everything on earth, everything in the universe, is made up of precise combinations of the most basic elements, and those elements were created in stars’ nuclear cores. We could also say, “If you wish to make a pot from scratch, you must first invent the universe.”
These star-forged elements combine to form all the components of ceramics: the different strains of clay (silicon and iron), the water used in throwing (oxygen and hydrogen), the arboreal ingredients of glazes (calcium), and even the potter himself (carbon). Entire books could be written focusing solely on one of these ceramic elements.
Copper, for example. Copper red glazes have been meticulously pursued and produced since the fifteenth century in China. The new host of Cosmos, Neil deGrasse Tyson, often analyzes the concept of a “Goldilocks planet” – a planet which has the precise conditions for possibly sustaining life. A successful copper red glaze is a “Goldilocks glaze.” Everything in both the recipe and the firing must be perfect.
Caution: No room for error.
As Sagan and Tyson have taught us, science is found in everything we do. Baking an apple pie from scratch, developing a new drug, and mixing and firing glazes all rely on experimentation, creativity, and chemical reactions. A potter doesn’t need a degree in chemistry, but he uses some pretty cool science to produce copper red glazes.
Nowadays, gas-fired kilns produce the best conditions for copper red glazes, but ancient Chinese potters created their beautiful pieces using only wood-fired kilns. Many potters do not have regular access to gas- or wood-fired kilns, and use electric ones instead. Electric kilns eliminate the need for constant temperature monitoring, but they are unable to create the atmosphere copper red glazes require.
Hello in there!
Copper red glazes need to be fired to a temperature called “cone 10.” This photo shows three cones (small pieces of clay), set up inside a gas-fired kiln. Each of these pieces is made from a different factory-produced type of clay formulated to melt at a certain temperature. A device called a pyrometer can be used to measure the temperature of the air inside the kiln, but what really matters is the temperature of the clay, hence the use of cones. When cone 10 melts, the potter knows the clay is roughly 2345 °F.
Even inside the same kiln, the atmosphere unavoidably varies. The pots below all had the same glaze and firing, but were placed in different areas of the kiln.
The green color on the right also occurs when firing a copper glaze in an electric kiln.
Color, just like copper, depends on the stars. Light from our sun strikes objects on earth, and those objects absorb some wavelengths of light and reflect others. The wavelengths they reflect are the colors we see. As Tyson puts it:
“Color is the way our eyes perceive how energetic light waves are.” – Neil Degrasse Tyson. “Hiding in the Light.” Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey. Fox. 2014.
Thankfully, potters did not have to create the universe to make pots from scratch. Their ingredients are already present in the cosmos, swirling in the air and lurking in the earth, waiting for them.
Chuquicamata Copper Mine in Chile. (Image: Property of Till Niermann, located in the Wikimedia Commons.)
With the winter-threatening winds howling outside, can you believe this sunny photo was taken less than two weeks ago? On Sunday, September 29th, the weather was a summery 80 degrees for the Millstream Arts Festival. Sixty-four artists sweated it out on the streets of St. Joseph, bringing in sales not only for themselves, but also for local businesses.
Bold new signage at the Local Blend.
Joel’s unique symbiotic partnership with the Local Blend continues to cultivate this relationship between artist and business year-round. This was Joel’s fourth year participating in Millstream and his second year throwing pots in front of the Local Blend. This location and his kick-powered wheel have consistently shown to bring in more sales. If you weren’t looking closely as you strolled down Minnesota Street, you may have missed him because of the crowd that gathered to watch pots being made!
No pressure, Joel.
Many of you may have heard about (and maybe entered!) Joel’s recent Shark Tank Pottery Giveaway. We selected the winners the day after Millstream, and gave those who stopped by the booth one last reminder to enter.
Thanks again to all who took the time to enter!
As fun as this contest was, as much as Joel wants to bring his wheel to national TV – the local community remains paramount to his business model and poignant to him as an artist. This is where his pottery began. The local community is where Joel earns his livelihood, giving him the stability to pursue his bigger dreams and schemes.
The finicky process and the final product.
Joel participates in 3 weekly farmers’ markets in Sartell, St. Cloud, and St. Joseph, Minnesota. These farmers’ markets, along with art festivals such as Millstream and Art in Bayfront Park in Duluth, Minnesota, cultivate the local emphasis essential to Joel’s artistic philosophy. Here, customers can handle the pottery, watch it being made, and get to know the artist.
Throwing pots in Duluth at Art in Bayfront Park.
Then, when someone takes home a mug, its mysteries become more accessible and appreciated. That spiral in the clay, those finger marks in the glaze, they now have memory and meaning in them.
As of recent, Joel Cherrico has moved from the residency at Saint Ben’s to another studio located in the heart of downtown St. Cloud, The Paramount. Saint Ben’s has been mother’s milk to Cherrico pottery, a refuge for this clay slinging potter, however, as the tides change and the phases of the moon advance, so must Cherrico pottery. The Paramount will become the fortress from where the clay of the earth turns into functional vessels. Before bidding the Saint Ben’s Studio adue, a few projects for his Artist Residency were fired in the kilns at Saint Ben’s. The first included in total: 300 modest slim formed Communion cups, 2 immaculate pouring vessels, 2 pitchers and 2 bowls.
The other project was made for a Saint John’s Groom and Saint Ben’s Bride. Included was a 6 person tableset (6 medium plates, 6 dinner plates, 6 coffee mugs and 6 bowls) for a wedding Registry. Check it out on Etsy– it’s like Ebay, but entirely handmade (entirely awesome):
The new shift to The Paramount will produce new work from the same ilk. The artists’ community found at the Paramaount will bring forth a new threshold to the ever evolving techniques, styles, and form of Cherrico ceramics.
Cherrico’s ceramics can be viewed and purchased at the Paramount Gallery. On the tables of crystal glass, vessels and forms of all kinds sit in await of peoples attention. The Milky Way galaxy swirls of glaze draw people in from the main drag in downtown St. Cloud. Mugz are adorned with a Nuka glaze that begs for you to pour a bold hot coffee into it. And the serving bowls, wide deep as the Continental Divide basin, are ready for use at a summer event at the lake cabin or a get together in your home. Come in, stop on by, check out this display of pottery, and by chance you may meet the artist himself at the Paramount Gallery
The styles that are hatching from the new Residency at The Paramount Center for the Arts are creative and breakthrough. Shapes and forms are being experimented on to best honor the suite of Ceramic enthusiasts. Working all through day, and into the night, the artist plugs into the funky cerebral music and starts another fresh pot of coffee, in order to find forms that can jigsaw worldly tastes.
