Q&A with Daryn Lowman

1. How did you choose those specific pieces of art for the show?
As an object, the teapot contains so many possibilities for design and expression. I also enjoy the historical, cultural and domestic relationships of this object.

2. How do they show your abilities as an artist?
Making teapots demands the maker to consider the combination of parts. How do they (all the parts) coexist, what proportions create the most interesting composition, how does the design invite the user to handle / use the piece, does the teapot function? In representing these thoughts I see the teapot as a sculpture or a painting in that the parts of the whole come together to share an idea or concept.

3. Which is your favorite piece of art that you put in the gallery?
I really enjoy teapot #25 – for me, this piece represents the playful nature I strive to install in working with clay.

4. Are these pieces very recently made or are they a collection of the last few years?
The collection of teapots represent a collection of demonstrations in my classes, and also pieces made and fired at my wood kiln in North Branch, Minnesota. The entire grouping of 31 teapots contains works made in the last 2 months, and some made as much as 15 years ago.

5. What do you hope students learn from looking at your art?
Great question – I hope students take away the idea of focus, or how one object may be played and explored for a limitless period of time. Also, the idea of how the process contains a narrative. The story of making, building, assembling, all of these movements at one point involved working with a pliable, soft material – in the finished state, of all these decisions and actions becoming permanent, almost like the markings on a stone or rock – displaying the passage of time on its surface and in its shape.