While choosing the form for the many functional items in my life (a piece furniture, a bicycle, a pocket knife, a lamp, etc) I favor the most familiar or iconic pieces available. For instance when I imagine a bicycle I think of the basic silhouette of a bike with a top tube that runs parallel with the ground and that’s why I picked my current bike.
It is basically an emoji of a bicycle. Even though it is covered in a confetti paint scheme the basic shape is comforting and familiar.
When I think of pots the immediate image that jumps into my mind is the pot of ‘HUNNY’ that Winnie the Pooh always kept around. So when I set out to make pottery I wanted that familiar shape but just as in the case of my favorite bicycle I wanted it to have something that made it stand out too.
A lot of my art plays with the idea of the expected seen alongside something unexpected or even jarring! (More on this in a future post) So in the case of my Cactus Pots I try to keep the color schemes fun and I distort the shape to take on a more squat appearance. This is a nod to a flat desert landscape and it makes the cactus stand out and be the star of the show.
-Mark Wilhelm
Dishes and Dragons 