Pots in the City
For a while, I lived in Brooklyn, NY. Not in the hip, happening Brooklyn most people think of these days. My neighborhood was a bit removed—geographically and culturally—from the metropolis many think of when we think of New York City.
Part performance art pieces, part social experiments, my Art Carts were public transit friendly, mobile pottery delivery devices that I designed and built to transport and sell my pots in NYC. They allowed me the freedom to move about the city by using the subway, limited only by the location of elevators. My first stop after building my first Art Cart was a sidewalk beside a Green Market in Brooklyn. Often, I would often set up near other street vendors. Most of these vendors were selling some sort of souvenirs along side their umbrellas, socks and Iphone cases. All of it, if not functional, was soulless, and made in China. I found it curious, that tourists would travel from all over the world, and purchase these trinkets. So I started making City Mugs.
They began with pictures of the city. Since arriving in Brooklyn I had taken many pictures. So, I began experimenting with them to make decals. I printed some with images of the city I had taken, and applied them to mugs to see what I would get. What really drove my interest in them was nostalgia. Remembering a particular day, or people and places from the past, can bring us the same sense of joy that we experienced on those days. In capturing these places and placing it on my mugs I hoped to provide an opportunity for nostalgia every time someone uses the mug, and remembers that time and place. Either the place depicted on the mug, or the time they met a potter on the street in New York City.
Now here I am, in Vermont, years, and miles away from those streets. I sometimes use my Art Cart, but I am no longer making these mugs. I don’t plan on making any more of them, but I am offering some of them from that time, and place here.
Part performance art pieces, part social experiments, my Art Carts were public transit friendly, mobile pottery delivery devices that I designed and built to transport and sell my pots in NYC. They allowed me the freedom to move about the city by using the subway, limited only by the location of elevators. My first stop after building my first Art Cart was a sidewalk beside a Green Market in Brooklyn. Often, I would often set up near other street vendors. Most of these vendors were selling some sort of souvenirs along side their umbrellas, socks and Iphone cases. All of it, if not functional, was soulless, and made in China. I found it curious, that tourists would travel from all over the world, and purchase these trinkets. So I started making City Mugs.
They began with pictures of the city. Since arriving in Brooklyn I had taken many pictures. So, I began experimenting with them to make decals. I printed some with images of the city I had taken, and applied them to mugs to see what I would get. What really drove my interest in them was nostalgia. Remembering a particular day, or people and places from the past, can bring us the same sense of joy that we experienced on those days. In capturing these places and placing it on my mugs I hoped to provide an opportunity for nostalgia every time someone uses the mug, and remembers that time and place. Either the place depicted on the mug, or the time they met a potter on the street in New York City.
Now here I am, in Vermont, years, and miles away from those streets. I sometimes use my Art Cart, but I am no longer making these mugs. I don’t plan on making any more of them, but I am offering some of them from that time, and place here.