ARTISTS STATEMENT
Barry Weiss

Making pottery fulfills the very essence of my inquiring mind. It requires right and left-brain thinking, a challenge to my creative and artful side, a sobering inquiry into the chemistry of clay, glazes and color, a discipline for attentive detail, patience developed through Zen like repetition and practice, mindfulness, a child’s love of fun and the satisfaction of success through my own efforts.

In an attempt to achieve my results I work in stoneware and porcelain clays. Stoneware allows me to produce my pots that have a more rugged, earthy and organic feel. I incorporate slip decoration and multiple glazes that are sprayed on the pot me to achieve overlap and a seamless blend of colors that flow and “work” with the design of the form.

Porcelain is beautiful, white, smooth and luxurious. It’s ideal for amplifying the pottery forms that I make on the potters wheel and the colors and intricate frost, or pedal-like crystals produced within crystalline glazes that I create. 

I think that for me, the process of working with clay is a metaphor for life… There’s a beginning, middle and an end. It’s three-dimensional and is limited only to my imagination and hard work. It’s reflective of my soul and passion while being spiritual, sensitive and demanding. Each time I sit at the potter’s wheel the journey begins.