Amazing that you had the opportunity to meet Cardew. Sounds like you have a long experience with clay.

Re: the dunting – it has happened on several pieces, both with a high-frit white/verdigris as well as with nothing/verdigris. Although on this piece I think the interior/exterior glaze combination, combined with too-rapid cooling were the main culprits, the fact that I throw extremely thin, along with the form and rim (not the sturdiest) doesn’t help. Our large group kiln is shared, and so controlling the firings and cooling rate can be difficult. I do think, however, I will try this combo again, for experimentation – and spray the bisque piece with water aggressively so that the interior glaze is as thin as can be.

That anecdote about the exploding pot is amazing! Must have been an awesome sight.

The glaze and the pot form are great. If I were you, I’d make a test piece and fire the same combination again, but with a slightly thinner interior coating.

The Bohm book is best in the first part – as it progresses it gets into more technical/physics aspects. Early on, though, it argues that wholeness is the natural state of things, and that fragmented thinking and approaches bring fragmented results.

http://www.hotelsantacruz.com/turismo/images/guanabana.jpg

Guanabana indeed! Hahaha.

Although I have studied in several areas, my formation in education for development from FUNDAEC molded my thought and actions the most. I use parts of their materials in my classes. Although my classes are in English, my students have a high-intermediate or slightly higher English level, so very few would be able to work with a text by Bohm. It makes teaching such deep concepts quite tricky. We watch the 8 diet for a new america videos available on youtube to introduce the topic as most have not questioned how their diet choices relate to their value system. We also focus on evolution of the human spirit, which I explored here, check it out:

http://iguanajournal.blogspot.com/2008/05/stages-of-growth.html

I have not read the text you refer to, but I would like to. I will look for it, thanks for the tip.

@ Farnaz: When are you coming to visit, then?

@ Brent: Those selections are wonderful and shed more light on the subject – the purpose of every Revelation being to effect a transformation in the whole character of mankind …. ! And the Rumi is fantastic. Had never read it. Thanks.

@ Justin: Soursop! I was thinking aquatic, but tropical fruit works too. What field do you specialize in? And what materials are you using to explore the investigation of truth as an issue of inner/outer coherence with your students? Bohm’s “Wholeness and the Implicate Order” springs to mind.

I am teaching a course now about the role of the individual in society and currently we are exploring the principle of investigating truth as an issue of coherence between our inner and outer lives. It is very rewarding as a teacher and I hope it is as well for my students! Nice post.

And the quotation brings other quotes from Baha’u'llah to mind: “Words must be followed by deeds; words without deeds are as bees that yield no honey, as trees that bear no fruit…” (The Bahá’í World 1926-1928, Volume II, pp. 62-63)

“Amongst the people is he who seateth himself
amid the sandals by the door whilst coveting in his heart the seat of honour. Say: What manner of man art thou, O vain and heedless one, who wouldst appear as other than thou art?” (Most Holy Book, paragraph 36)

“…is not the object of every Revelation to effect a transformation in the whole character of mankind, a transformation that shall manifest itself both outwardly and inwardly, that shall affect both its inner life and external conditions?” (The Book of Certitude, p. 240)

And Rumi:
The mentor says, “O raw hastener, through patient waiting, You must climb to the summit step by step. Boil your pot by degrees and in a masterly way; Food boiled in mad haste is spoiled. Doubtless God could have created the universe By the fiat ‘Be!’ in one moment of time;
Why, then, did He protract His work over six days, Each of which equaled a thousand years, O disciple? Why does the formation of an infant take nine months? Because God’s method is to work by slow degrees, Why did the formation of Adam take forty days? Because his clay was kneaded by slow degrees. Not hurrying on like you, O raw one…

Brent

BTW: I love that you tried to tell a story with a verdigris glaze on the outside and a creamy pristine white on the inside and the texture is rapturous!