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Well that's that
Dec. 5th, 2023 08:42 pmLast night I went over to help the person who's going to run the administrative part of the pottery studio put together glazes. I'd ganked and repurposed a google spreadsheet of a good range of glazes that all used a relatively small subset of the available ingredients so we wouldn't have to get every available material to have a reasonable colour range. The spreadsheet calculated costs and required amounts. She didn't like all my glaze choices so we went through possible ones and settled on a slightly different set after a couple hours.
Near the end I asked straight out if my being part of the studio was a problem, that the program manager there had told me several times and was telling other people that as a "production potter" I wasn't welcome and they weren't there to support me. I said, look, I'll go elsewhere if you want, just tell me.
She spent awhile explaining the program manager's point of view, and said that I was "borderline" and that I "would know when it was time to leave, she wouldn't tell me". She said I was using more resources than other people (which would only be the kilns, since I do my wheelwork at home and haven't used any other equipment) and that despite having two full kilnloads per month as what was written into the rules as a cutoff above which you had to pay more, that my 2/3 of a kiln a month (spread over two kilns, a bisque and a glaze firing) was excessive. She added that she didn't know how much anything cost.
I also got the distinct impression that she didn't consider any mentoring I did to be valuable, and when I offered to spend more time volunteering around the studio to offset the resources I used she said that wasn't it.
So.
The community of folks there is great, they're fun to talk to, it's amazing to see their work, but I can't see sustaining a $30/month membership plus annual nonprofit membership plus kiln fees without comfortable access to kiln or equipment. So I guess I'll stay there and bisque my pieces in the meantime and stockpile them in crates until I can sort out my own kiln and pull back from the proactive stuff. If they're bisqued they're more likely to survive, and if I don't glaze fire them I'll be using less kiln resource.
I suspect this means they'll be firing their kilns not entirely full, but I guess that's not my problem anymore.
There's a couple in town that does pottery -- well, at the end of a long road anyhow -- and he mentioned that he sometimes fires his kiln half empty, I wonder if they'd be open to an arrangement? And he seems genuinely enthusiastic to talk to me, and she has too.
I want to call in sick and cry for a couple days but the next two days at work are helicopter stuff so I need to be really on my game, then Kelsey is here so I need to clean up etc. It'll be good to see and talk to her. I haven't really been talking to the folks who care about me lately.
Near the end I asked straight out if my being part of the studio was a problem, that the program manager there had told me several times and was telling other people that as a "production potter" I wasn't welcome and they weren't there to support me. I said, look, I'll go elsewhere if you want, just tell me.
She spent awhile explaining the program manager's point of view, and said that I was "borderline" and that I "would know when it was time to leave, she wouldn't tell me". She said I was using more resources than other people (which would only be the kilns, since I do my wheelwork at home and haven't used any other equipment) and that despite having two full kilnloads per month as what was written into the rules as a cutoff above which you had to pay more, that my 2/3 of a kiln a month (spread over two kilns, a bisque and a glaze firing) was excessive. She added that she didn't know how much anything cost.
I also got the distinct impression that she didn't consider any mentoring I did to be valuable, and when I offered to spend more time volunteering around the studio to offset the resources I used she said that wasn't it.
So.
The community of folks there is great, they're fun to talk to, it's amazing to see their work, but I can't see sustaining a $30/month membership plus annual nonprofit membership plus kiln fees without comfortable access to kiln or equipment. So I guess I'll stay there and bisque my pieces in the meantime and stockpile them in crates until I can sort out my own kiln and pull back from the proactive stuff. If they're bisqued they're more likely to survive, and if I don't glaze fire them I'll be using less kiln resource.
I suspect this means they'll be firing their kilns not entirely full, but I guess that's not my problem anymore.
There's a couple in town that does pottery -- well, at the end of a long road anyhow -- and he mentioned that he sometimes fires his kiln half empty, I wonder if they'd be open to an arrangement? And he seems genuinely enthusiastic to talk to me, and she has too.
I want to call in sick and cry for a couple days but the next two days at work are helicopter stuff so I need to be really on my game, then Kelsey is here so I need to clean up etc. It'll be good to see and talk to her. I haven't really been talking to the folks who care about me lately.
