By: Laura Silvernail
The cream-colored clay felt cool between her fingers as the Shimpo Whisper wheel quietly spins beneath her fingertips. She heard her kids playing outside and felt the wind as it swept into her studio in the garage, where little footprints stood out from among the clay dust that settled on the ground.
Once the potter, Catie Daniel, had her clay centered, she began to form the bottom, with her blue eyes fixed on the wheel. Just as she was pulling the first wall, a group of children appeared at the opening of the garage. They were curious as cats and stared in awe as she took her second pull.
One of the children spoke up. “What are you doing?” he asked.
The potter quickly explained she was wheel-throwing. After gazing at the shelves full of glazed pots, the kids gravitated outside. She overheard her oldest son, Jude, speaking.
“Yeah, my mom is an artist,” he said proudly.
It all started out in nowhere Mississippi near Ocean Springs, when a young homeschooler brought home an orange hand-built clay car from Emily Fuqua’s studio. The boys in his homeschool group had done a ceramics class, while the girls took part in a drawing class.
The boy’s older sister, loved the car and thought to herself, “Clay is not just for boys.” The next week she started throwing on an old rickety wheel with a leaky splash pan.
Daniel wheel threw in Fuqua’s studio from then until she was 15. Fuqua paid Daniel $5.25 an hour to teach kids how to wheel throw in an after-school program. Daniel said it was the best job she had ever had because she had access to the kilns, glazes and free clay.
Now, this 32-year-old artist and potter, like many others in the South who fell in love with the wheel, is creating work that captures motherhood and finding joy in the mundane. Today, she sells her pottery and paintings through the Caron Gallery in Mississippi and on Etsy. Her love for art has continued throughout her life as a busy wife and mother.
Daniel met her husband, Justin Daniel, in the church she grew up in. The couple got married a month before she turned 21. After the couple planted roots in Biloxi, Mississippi, Daniel started an art studio with another artist called “Strange Bird Studio” in a space downtown.
After two years, Daniel was pregnant with her first son, Jude. Daniel ended up working at a coffee shop called Southern Grounds for $8.25 an hour. Daniel decided to stay home and take care of her first born and figure out how an at-home studio would work.
“Some women, probably my generation of women, probably would have given up the artwork and run the family,” Jean Manduca, Catie’s mother, said. She added, “Instead of work life balance, it's more like a harmony. You got to kind of work with the time that you have, so I've really been proud of her that she didn't give it up.”
Two years later, Daniel had her son Theo, and then Daniel became pregnant with her daughter three years after that. At that time, Daniel’s husband Justin was working as a Hospice chaplain.
Daniel worked at Starbucks from 4 p.m. to 10 p.m. during this time for the medical insurance while also still trying to find time to paint and make pots. Her husband, was working from 8 a.m. to whenever he would see his last client, driving all over Mississippi.
When Daniel had her daughter, Eisley, she quit her job at Starbucks and worked from home trying to support the family income through her artwork. When Covid-19 hit, Daniel found comfort in the everyday things.
Two little hands hold out treasures found in the backyard. Dandelions reflect in the eldest’s glasses while both boys offer them as a gift to their mother. Three oranges lay peeled out on the kitchen counter, each forming its own unique shape.
During the lock down these are the things that Daniel found comfort in. These are what inspired her “mundane series.” These sparked paintings of toys left out, peeled oranges and acorns found on their daily walks.
“A lot of the things that moms do behind the scenes that or just no one wants to do it feels like very overlooked. I felt like a lot of my life was that because it is, and so my work was a way to show off some of the overlooked parts of me and my life,” Daniel said.
Although things began to settle down in October of 2020, after the family moved because of a job opportunity for Justin in Montgomery, Alabama, she continued her series.
Eventually her focus on the Mundane in her watercolor paintings worked its way into her clay practices. Daniel mixed brush strokes, acorns and plant textures with her pots and accentuated them by using black underglaze. Daniel used the tires of her kids’ toys to make patterns in the clay.
A larger “mother” pot stands ready to pour into the six smaller cups resting beside her. Each cup decorated with brush strokes and an autumn-colored glaze. The pitcher stands tall with a long handle, textured brushstrokes accompanying its yellow glaze.
“She's begun to incorporate some leaf pressings into the pottery, and she's also started to paint willows and things on the cups,” Marshall Blevins, artist and Daniel’s friend, said.
A bisque-fired mug sits ready to be glazed. Its form carved into, creating the shape of a willow. Black underglaze extenuates this texture and adds depth to an object that is normally “mundane.”
While Daniel wants to buy a pug mill, to recycle clay, and expand her studio space that takes up only half of the garage, she said she will have been a successful artist if she just raises her three children well.
“I can work around the priority of family. I like that about art, and I feel like if I picked any other career, I'd probably be a lot more torn between quitting that thing and being here for them. I feel like art is a lot more conducive to that,” Daniel said.
Comentários