Crafts – A Place For Our Stuff

“Beautiful in form and feature, lovely as the day, can there be so fair a creature formed of common clay?” Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Longfellow was probably referring to the creature that God formed from clay…us. You know, human beings. Until hardened by the kiln or the environment clay can be formed to most anything that you want it to be. A statue or bust, a pot, a trap shooting target.

Humans are as malleable too. With luck, the form will be a good one before life hardens us.

At the invitation of the mayor, Beth and I met with some friends last Sunday for a one hour clay spinning class at Art On The Town Wisconsin in downtown Beaver Dam.

For a nominal hourly fee, we received hands on instruction from owner Kris Schumacher, two one pound slabs of clay and the use of a pottery spinner. The photo above pictures the fruits of our labor. We will return to choose a glaze before they are fire hardened in the kiln.

Mayor Becky has more pictures and I will add them to this post after I ask her to forward them to me.

Pottery is one of the oldest human inventions dating back 25,000 years BC. The pottery wheel dates back to 4,500 years BC.

Humanity has always needed a place for their stuff and clay pots are still a decorative means to that end. Pottery was an answer to that need as far back as 27,000 to 30,000 years ago.

I’d hazard a guess that there are few, if any other functional and recreational activities that we share with those distant ancestors from the Neolithic period.

If you are interested and live in the BD area; Art On The Town Wisconsin can be found on FaceBook and on their website. https://artonthetownwi.com/

Granted our masterpieces will not hold much stuff, but I’m hoping to use mine as planters!