Jay Jasper's Blog, page 87

Vying (and Dying) for Love

From the Northwest of the United States

Louwala-Clough tells the tale of a love triangle of the gods and a fiery sibling rivalry that required some pretty extreme parental intervention.

Louwala- Clough – a raku pottery vase inspired by legend.

The indigenous people in the north west of the United States told early explorers a tale about a mountain called Louwala-Clough; you may know this mountain as Mount St. Helens.

According to legend, this mountain used to be a beautiful woman who was named Loowit. There were two braves, who happened to be brothers that were vying for her love. These were not just any two braves, for they were the sons of the Great Spirit, Sahale.

Unfortunately, Loowit spoiled by choice, could not decide which of these brothers to choose. This only intensified the rivalry between the two brothers Wyeast and Klickitat. They fought intensely, leaving a fiery trail of destruction around them, throwing rocks and liquid fire at one another, burning villages and forest alike.

Their father, the Great Spirit, Sahale grew weary of the destruction caused by his battling sons and the indecisive beauty Loowit. In a move that would be frowned upon by any of today’s authorities on parenting, but probably very much appreciated by the locals of the time, he decided to smite all three of them.

Louwala-Clough is featured in our first book A Potter’s Dream: Myths & Legends

In their place he erected three mountain peaks, Loowit was turned to a beautiful snow covered peak (Mount St. Helens), Wyeast (Mount Hood) with his head raised in pride, and Klickitat (Mount Adams) with his gaze fixed on Loowit for all of eternity – or until erosion ultimately gets the better of the three.

Now due to her indecisiveness Loowit gets to spend what will seem like an eternity with two rock solid men and is spared the anguish of choice.

You can see more images of the raku vase ‘Louwala-Clough’ here.

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Vase In Focus – Hephaestus’ Forge

It was his ugly appearance that inspired Zeus to choose him

So that the match would not inspire jealousy among other male deities. It was also his ugly appearance and a lack of love in the match that caused Aphrodite to have many affairs with both gods and men.

The Dom Deluise type with a club foot was not for her.

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What Glazing Should Your Vase Get?

We are excited to add this vase to theGrowing Pottery Gift BasketThat YOU could win! (And here’s how!)and We would like to ask for your input on what kind of glazing it should get.Which glaze style do you think would best suit this vase? What colour should I be?Visit our raku vase page here and choose your favourite vase photo
(will open in a new window)then share the name of the vase with your favourite glaze as a comment belowWe will narrow it down and then have a vote to reach our winner!You can see this vase being made in this video.Sign up for our newsletter to be added and become a possible winner!– click here to find out how –We hope you Enjoy
your weekend!

The Myth of Family Members

Every family has it’s stories.

In The Myth of Family, we explored family from a spiritual, cultural, emotional, and personal perspective through the use of sculpture and vases. The idea of the ‘Tree of Life’ and ‘Family Tree’ is prominent in these works.

Each piece tells part of the interwoven story that explores our collective roots and the twisted branches that tell the tale of our human family and experience through myths and stories from around the world and throughout time.

The Eye Of Balor is part of this family.$288
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The Eye of Balor’, tells the tale of an Irish giant, a prophecy, his captive daughter, some serious control issues, a late night rendezvous and a whole lot of famillicide!

You can see it in the show video below or, if your curiosity is piqued,
in closer detail with the full story here.

The Eye of Balor was one of the raku vases featured in The Myth Of Family“The other night I ate at a real nice family restaurant.
Every table had an argument going.”

— George CarlinSign up for our newsletter to be entered to win your own raku vase (and more!)

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🙏 World Art Day 🙏

Art enables us to find ourselves Pit Firing
and lose ourselves A close up of Poseidon’s Adventureat the same time Winter SunsetThe Healing Vase ProjectThank you for being a part of our world!What does Art mean for you in your life?win your own raku vase (and more!)

– click here to find out how –

On The Wheel Wednesday

Centering clay centres my soul. I open myself to flow toward that place where there is neither push nor pull and only the soft touch of all things in a perfectlyeffortless balanceWhat do you like to do to get in the flow/Get into balance?win your own raku vase (and more!)

– click here to find out how –

The Alchemist’s Studio In a Nutshell

We are very excited to share a video with you that we’ve created as a very short promotional piece to highlight our process and work! We have also added this video to the front page of our website

If you have a spare minute and change, you can see the video below, or better yet check us out on youtube and subscribe to our channel! I would love to hear your impressions and thoughts on this video!

Thanks for reading, and maybe watching!

Sign up for our newsletter to be entered to win your own raku vase (and more!)

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Life In Colour

“Colour is a power which directly influences the soul.” ― Wassily Kandinsky We put up new wallpaper over the weekend and wanted to share it with you in case it may
help brighten your day with a splash of colour.Have you done any upgrades to your home during the pandemic?

We would love to hear about
it in the comments!

Click here to view more pieces

Sign up for our newsletter to be entered to win your own raku vase (and more!)

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Don’t Go Chasing Waterfalls: The Rivers And Lakes That You Are Used To May Save You From Hell

‘Father of the Sea‘, tells the tale of a Titan who can breathe in water, the Cassanova of the sea, and the only Titan to escape hell. It even shows us how to stay neutral in a family conflict – which can also be its own special kind of hell. So move over Poseidon, because before you there was Oceanus!

It’s not an easy childhood, when all the tongues in the known universe are wagging about who your father is. Fortunately for Oceanus, there were only a few beings at that time and some of them didn’t even have tongues.

Just imagine Chaos with a tongue!

Father Of The Sea
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However when your mother Gaia is making as many babies as possible, and your ‘father’ is an over worked single dad, something is likely to fall through the cracks.

And it may be you; and that crack may form a mighty river.

If all that was not confusing enough, there where whispers among Oceanus’ parents, that maybe – in one of her more ‘fertile’ moods – his mother Gaia visited her omnigender parent Chaos.

In spite of all this, Oceanus knew enough to keep these whisperings hush hush. He did not want to rock the boat. There was already enough actual Chaos in the family.

Father of The Sea15 Æons later . . .

Oceanus often questioned his brother Cronus’ growing power. Rather than fight him, Cronus gave him dominion of the river at the end of the world.

Little did Cronus know that this would be the river from which all water would come. A fact which came in pretty handy when your name has Ocean right in it. He is not Riverus after all…

As you may remember from a previous story, Cronus would eventually depose his father Uranus, and take his throne. This would be short lived, for Uranus’ son would do the same. Then Cronus and his Titan siblings asked Uranus to participate in quashing the rebellion of young upstart Zeus.

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Phew!

Fortunately, Oceanus and his wife Tethys were busy making babies too – in total about 3,000! Unlike his official father, Oceanus was a good dad. In the end this would save him! For all of his others siblings would lose the war against the new gods of Olympus and rather than fighting, Oceanus spent his time quietly making more babies, new rivers and their river gods, and of course the nymphs.

In the end it was the original river that Oceanus was cast down to that would act as a buffer against Tarturus (hell) where all of his Titan rebel siblings would be imprisoned.

Oceanus and Tethys were just glad they heeded the advice of legendary 1990’s Soothsayers TBoz, Left Eye anD chilli.Not chasing waterfalls and Tethys saved Oceanus from hell!

If you enjoyed this story/vase, you can check out more of them here. All of our vases are for sale.

Sign up for our newsletter to be entered to win your own raku vase (and more!)

– click here to find out how –

Mugshot Monday

“The block of sky in our twin high windows became a nectarine, amber and rose pink, and we lay in silence as white sunlight broke.”

― Aspen Matis Mug 12 $35
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More mugs can be viewed here.

If you don’t see one for sale in the colour you like,
please contact us and we can work with you directly.