LOUISE POTGIETER

ARTIST’S STATEMENT:

I’ve been thinking about these little vessel pots a lot

trying to verbalise meaning

to figure out the object of these objects 

I like to say that the process of making the bodies of these forms

is my “Smoking” –
Keeping my hands busy, 
Soothing myself,
Keeping time. 

I can do it anywhere.

It’s kind of mindless, like meditation but much less precious

And much more sensuous 

And it is just the right size to hold.

Each vessel is formed by making two pinch pots, joining them together,

cutting a hole, making a “neck”, shaping the rim

attaching the two and 

carving the foot.

The engraving/ carving and painting part is more conscious, focused, considered.

Mostly I let the pot dictate the plant it will bear
Sometimes I’ll make a vessel with a particular plant in mind 

I make careful Portraits of plants
of plants that I’ve encountered, that I’ve been in relation to, 
that I’ve.. witnessed

I mostly engrave the outlines into the claybody with a toothpick

sometimes I scratch away

so it stands out in relief

I like best to work in real time, looking, but I also work from my photographs. I do love photographing plants! 

Unless I carve pre-painted clay,

the colour gets added after the Bisque and before the Glaze firing.

I love that ceramics entail all the elements

I’ve been thinking about why I make these ‘containers’ and what they “mean” and that’s not easy 

I think I’m trying to preserve a moment, 

the here and now, something Precious

(no, not preserve but Memorialize (?) 
or Honour (?) 
no this all sounds way too pretentious)

I’d like them to hold Remembrance

I mean to say, 
these vessels are a way of remarking life

a small record of being 

a moment in our passage

They were here 

(Sommer net!)

how lovely

and I was there

(and for this moment still, AM)

a line from T.S. Eliot comes to mind

“..  have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons,

I have measured my life with coffee spoons..”

Louise Potgieter, 17 July 2026.

All photographs by Niklas Zimmer.