A recent storm of comments has blown through the CLAYART (listserv) world concerning the magazine Ceramics Monthly, its selection of works to show and the work of Carlos Castanova on the April 2004 cover. Most of the comments were of the nature of "its ugly" or "its beautiful", which are value judgements of little use to any reader. Others defended the magazine without specifically defending the work, hinting by the omission that they may have agreed with the "its ugly" commentary. And a few others attempted to defend the work on the basis of the motivation of the artist and whether or not their intent was satisfied.
I must agree with the comments of Lorca Beebe that were posted to the same list in 1998 that "... it is very important for clay artists to develop their own vocabulary and discourse. So far, we are in my view, colonial subjects of other fine art forms. I believe clay has its own inherent formal language and needs to be addressed as such."
It is generally true that clay has a different tradition than do the other arts. That tradidion, often belittled as craft, lies in the production of utilitarion wares for daily life. This is one thing that the critics of the other arts have not had to deal with. If criticism of works in clay is to have a separate meaning we must develop a set of criteria that allow one to make the same value judgements of a vase or a plate that we would of an abstract or figurative sculpture with no utilitarian function at all.
I intend to use the items in this Aesthetics category to try an develop a vocublary that will be useful for anyone who is trying to criticise a work in clay, either their own or that of someone else. This may not be of use to anyone but myself and that is OK. I feel that I need to do this in order to have a reference point for my own work, to be able to put into words those value judgement I make every day when I decide that a piece "works" or not, when I decide to glaze a pot or recycle the clay or when I take a hammer to an entire kiln load and build the shard pile higher. If any of this interests you, you can check the archives under the Aesthetics Category. I also ask you to please participate with comments, I know that I will enjoy the discourse and together we may come up with somehting useful.