clay: stealing back from mass manufacture

Days 1 and 2 were wide open for me of our Palm Springs vacation, and we (Helen and I) let our hosts (Mark and Judy) set the itinerary for both days. On Day 1, we walked the El Paseo shopping district in Palm Desert. The only art I got to spy was this mural.   

It’s bold text in bright happy colors, which I appreciated and liked, but I felt art-starved and could have stayed home instead of come to this desert destination because I can find those same stores at the Stanford Shopping Center. I don’t care that they’re upscale and designer. They’re still mass manufactured goods. 

But I was delighted to find my favorite chain women’s department store to browse and get ideas anyway and went into Anthropologie. I spied these two vases I liked and wouldn’t mind copying if only to practice painting underglaze on to white stoneware. They could be so much more charming if they were handmade, which I suppose is the point I want to make.                         

I do like stripes, whether subtly banded on the outside of the pot like the pink and baby blue ceramic or in bright slashes like on the lip  of the mint green and darker pink.

And so should I create a coil pot or make my usual slab vases? Both I think. Coil the round shape and then make a slab lip. I'll tell Meral that I want to extrude lots of coils from Bmix when we return to the studio. And then I'll stamp text--I have the French script letter and the Sans Serif block letter stamps that I got from Paper Source years ago. I should buy a bag of Bmix at Meral's community studio and then make the coil pots in Zan's classroom studio. It's a plan:)

I have to return to El Paseo though to buy this lithograph at a Chuck Jones gallery popup.                        

 

I told Patrick that this lithograph reminds me of Charlie, the 2 year old son of Kate and Steve, our neighbors, and he wants to give it to Kate as a thanks for finding the buyer of the condo he just sold. I returned to the gallery during a lunch break from Sunnylands and was hoping to get it for a little discount of the $95 price tag. Instead the clerk offered me a discount on a giclee if a Chuck Jones painting called “Manhattan Beach” of which Patrick didn’t love and so we will live without.

Mark and Judy are not very active, and their idea of sightseeing on Day 2 was to drive Helen around Palm Springs while I picked up my rental car in Palm Desert and planned to join them for a Mexican lunch at La Mirasol. And after lunch, Mark and Judy nixed my invitation to cook them dinner last night, which was fine, and then let me go off and run errands. Poor Helen. I thought they were going to get out of the car and explore, but no they just wanted to smoke weed in her car and then go home and rest. I was tired and sleepy after that lunch and wanted the same. But I didn't nap and rather sewed and listen to an audiobook. I ran my errands of filling the gas tank and then buying a few groceries. I also did the touristy thing of Indio which was to visit the Shields Date Garden.           

The store closed at 5, but I didn't know the garden closed at 4. I had to call the store to unlock the gate that let me into the garden, during the stroll which had me rolling my eyes at the granite statues of Jesus's life, but I did like looking at all the different citrus tree and reading all their factoids. And really there's no tour of the actual date groves behind the visitors garden (I could only see a trailer park next to the date store), but there were a couple date trees on display.

And I bought a date shake for me and Helen. It was just okay. Dates are plenty sweet enough as are ice cream shakes. The two together are just okay. Really I prefer my ice cream with this just like I like my coffee....                              

I'm getting more boring as I vacation as an almost senior citizen. I was at the Marriott resort and golf club to pick up my rental car. Sadly this is my idea of relaxation. I told Helen I was agog at boats in a lagoon in the lobby of the hotel, and she told me that the high-end large resorts in Mexico are the same                

 

And so while I waited for my rental car to be sanitized, I hydrated and explored the hotel a little.

 

I even liked the "clean" desert landscaping in the lobby. Just decomposed rocks tiny enough to not be dirty and dusty.

And the cactuses and succulents were real, not plastic. But leave the hotel and its manicured links and lawns, and the real world is not so sanitized and as gritty as a Mad Max movie. Still beautiful though desolate, desiccated dry and starkly hot.