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Christian Morris | Episode 674
Christian Morris is a multidisciplinary artist from Pittsburgh, Pa. Christian received his BA in art from California State University Channel Islands in 2016 and has since been building his practice as a studio potter in Pittsburgh, Pa. His study of jazz and blues improvisation influences Christian’s ceramic style. Christian is always seeking new methods in which to articulate layers of nuance and depth through his work.
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Jim Roan said, You are the average of your five closest friends. How important was the influence of the people around you for helping to build up a better you?
Yes, I think of it as a cast. I can’t go down this path or I will be too sad but, yeah, the whole thing. (pause) It’s pretty much, there’s just so much gratitude for this, for all those people. That’s my answer. (laughter) It’s just that I owe them everything. And I’m not anywhere, I mean I am some where better than I was for sure. But yeah, there’s no way I could have done anything.
In order to find the best you, is it important to be given lots of fresh and new opportunities to change horizons? So to speak.
Yeah, absolutely. So this is the perfect day for this because I got a couple of consignment, wholesale people reached out and I had to make all this stuff. So I just made eighty things. I took off painting for the past 2 months. So I just worked on ceramics. I bought a kiln awhile ago, about a year ago. I have a studio in my basement. Which is all lucky because painting is such a lucky thing to have. So I just literally shipped the stuff out this morning. So I went through the whole process. I mean I’ve sold stuff before. I had a little show with my sister. I saw people wanting stuff and they bought it and I thought, Oh my gosh, this is a thing I could make money from. And then today I really realized it and it’s no joke. It’s a very expensive sport here. Shipping, this is a rich kids sport. It’s beautiful. I assume I will sell most of the stuff. I won’t have lost anything and I don’t know that I will gain too much because shipping to Seattle from Pittsburg was 130 dollars and then all the stuff. But that’s just about me figuring out a better system.
How important is your vision of you? Of having a vision of yourself, of what you want to become? How important is that in order to build the best you?
I guess I am still trying to define that. We are going into so much ambiguity in the world. It seems like I can’t dream up anything that would hold any weight…but I can dream up habits and systems of thought, you know, ways of treating myself, the eating well, all that. I can implement habits that will be adaptable to whatever the future brings. Because it just feels so shaky, right?
How important is it to say yes to new opportunities?
It’s insanely important, yes. I don’t do it a lot so. Every time I do I grow and it’s painful but the reward is always an expanded perceptual awareness and I feel better and I think better.
How important is it to say no to opportunities and when do you decide it’s best to say no?
I don’t know. I say no a lot. But I know if it’s painful and it’s possible I should probably do it even though it’s painful. That’s where the rub is as a human I think. You’ve got to know yourself a bit. Does it lead to my, you know, evolution…I can’t say no to things that are adding up to a better version of myself.
I’ve heard it said, Don’t count the hours, count the progress. Is that something you depend on?
Oh yeah, for sure. I know that time well spent with good articulated goals that are written down and obvious, if you have a good system progress will happen.. I try to write everything down. That’s not good. I keep doing that, don’t do that next time. It’s the same when I am playing music. When I am playing does not represent what is written here or what I want it to feel like…so practice these scales to get better.
What do you got big coming up?
Just the galleries. So hopefully that stuff sells and I need to get a website together. I need a better name. My name is the most boring thing ever. I’d like it to be a little cooler maybe. If I could get that going and make money from ceramics. I mean, I’m making some and it’s out there but if I could not paint, which I don’t mind painting, it’s a good thing. But if I could not paint and make ceramics and potentially live on the West Coast somewhere, it doesn’t have to be the most expensive place, but the whole place is expensive unfortunately. If I could live that way making ceramics within a community of people and sharing information. That’s it.
Book
The Book of Delights by Ross Gay
Contact
Instagram: @christianalexandermorris