To celebrate its 40th Anniversary on March 9th and 10th, The Clay Studio has invited two of the most distinctive voices in the field of ceramics to create an “endurance” project that will span the entire 40 hours of the event. Ehren Tool and Jesse Albrecht are both veterans of Iraqi wars (Tool in the 1991 Gulf War and Albrecht in 2003-2004). Both artists use their experiences as Veterans to inform their participatory work. Since 2001, Ehren Tool has made and given away over 14,500 cups. These cups deal with issues of war and violence—it is his hope that the cups can start a conversation between people with firsthand experience with war, their friends and their loved ones.
During their 40 hours at The Clay Studio, Tool and Albrecht will build a “bunker” out of hundreds of pounds of unfired clay that will be transformed into hundreds of cups and ceramic vessels. Members of the public, and especially Philadelphia’s military community are encouraged to interact and collaborate with both artists to help create unique, functional works of art that participants can bring home with them once they have been glazed and fired.
Tool’s ongoing cup project is called Occupation, which speaks both to his military experiences and his vocational calling as a potter. Tool stresses that his project is not a performance, but an extension of his occupation as a potter:
“I make cups. If I wasn’t doing it at The Clay Studio I'd be doing it in my studio. I am not playing. I am doing work I believe in. In the face of war and the other horrors we face making a cup is a small and impotent gesture but I believe it is a worthwhile endeavor. Nothing I do will change the world and nothing in the world releases me from my obligation to try. I just make cups.”
Albrecht, who was deployed to Iraq as a medic in the Iowa National Guard, will be working alongside Tool for the duration of the project. In addition to interacting with the public, Albrecht will be constructing several of his distinctive War Crocks. In addition to calling attention to the double meaning of the word crock, Albrecht’s work serves as a “punching bag (that often punches back) and as a means to deliver a tiny portion of war to people”. In addition to “traditional” activities in the ceramic world, such as serving as an assistant to the recently departed ceramic legend Don Reitz, Albrecht has collaborated with the Combat Paper Project and is a member of the highly energetic collaborative group Paintallica.
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