We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Lori Coan a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Lori, so good to have you with us today. We’ve always been impressed with folks who have a very clear sense of purpose and so maybe we can jump right in and talk about how you found your purpose?
In my view, creativity is both a personal purpose and a shared experience. I’ve always felt this drive to make things, and if they don’t reach the world, it feels selfish. However, teaching others to be creative is equally important. It’s about fostering an environment where creativity is appreciated and encouraged. I’ve always been an artist, drawing, painting, and creating from a young age in my little room full of art supplies. Sharing my art became more focused when I graduated and worked in daycare, loving the project time with kids. This led me to become an art teacher for children, and later, for adults. I find teaching hand-building to adults in Tucson especially fulfilling.
Great, so let’s take a few minutes and cover your story. What should folks know about you and what you do?
I make functional work like mugs and bowls, but my favorite time exploring clay is spent making sculpture. Generally, my sculptures can be used as vases, but lately, I have really gotten excited about manipulating flat slabs of clay and piecing them together in ways that evoke movement and volume and energy. At the same time, I have been working to incorporate surface finishing techniques into the sculpting process, so that the excitement of building the piece carries over into the surface finishing. Normally, that finishing is done after a work is fired, which makes it a struggle to recapture the energy that creating the form inspired. But in my latest work, I have been using under-glaze and carving techniques before the pieces are fired for the first time. This makes the completed work more dynamic. The surface design is integral to the pieces, rather than merely resting on them. Typically, I start with a relatively simple geometric shape–for example, a cone or a cylinder–and use darting techniques, derived from sewing and textiles, manipulate the form. A lot of my work resembles abstracted dresses or female bodies in motion. My surface designs often involve abstracted representations of water, fire, and wind, translated into color and carved lines, because I think of the clay itself as the earth. This springs from my reflections on how people affect the world around them and how our environment affects us, with a particular focus on the Sonoran desert where I live.
There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?
Patience, receptiveness, and creative community. It is easy to get frustrated and feel like whatever you are doing isn’t good enough, but if you just keep coming back to the work every day, at some point you let go of the fear of getting it wrong. The more time you spend exploring, the more likely you are to find the thing you are looking for. This is related to receptiveness. Approaching studio time without expectations of what needs to happen gives you room to explore and discover new ways of working. For many people, art is a business and there are expectations, but you need to protect some time to play and explore, free of those pressures. This is about opening yourself to creative inspiration, which often comes in the form of small possibilities that are easily overlooked when you are too focused on tangible goals. Making art in a vacuum is soul deadening. I recommend taking a workshop or a class or joining a studio or guild of some kind. Talking with other artists about techniques and ideas and work that inspires you is so important. I came to teaching at my current studio because I missed the connections that people make when they are working together in a community space. My students are always asking questions and showing me their own inspirations, and this expands my own ability to think creatively.
Before we go, any advice you can share with people who are feeling overwhelmed?
Oftentimes, the thing that causes me to feel overwhelmed is the pressure to have work to sell–work that is accessible to everyone. But I don’t think art can be all about filling orders and making customers happy. There has to be room to keep the creative energy and spirit alive and to follow it where it leads. If I spent the rest of my life creating spoonrests and mugs, I don’t think I could carry on as an artist. When I am feeling this way, I set aside all of the work that is getting me down and pretend that there are no deadlines. I turn on some good music; open a bag of clay; and try something new and see where it leads.
Contact Info:
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mud_and_monsters/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/loricoanartist/
- Other: https://www.etsy.com/shop/CoanCreative
