happy spring

ON ONIONS

4/13/2024

(FOUR MINUTE READ)

Miyawaki Ayako “Onions” appliqué

Onions were a beloved subject of innovative Japanese appliqué artist, Miyawaki Ayako (1905-1995). She spoke of how she wanted to represent them as she really saw them, not in a preconceived pattern. She’d slice them and let them dry out on her countertop for a day or so and then draw their layers, which had separated slightly overnight. Their stalks bend, with little withered bits, just like in real life.

During this (almost) past winter, I started to make some small jars, little orbs that fit snugly in one hand. They have conical lids, and I found myself thinking of them as my onions. They’re not realistic onions the way Miyawaki Ayako captured them, but they have an unmistakable onion-like vibe about them - pulled right up from the ground and sort of newly unaccustomed to light.

Since college, a chapter from Brothers Karamazov entitled An Onion ‘Луковка’(Part 3, Book 7, Chapter III) has stuck with me. In it, Grushenka tells the parable of the onion that her cook told her when she was a girl. It goes like this: A wicked old woman dies and goes to hell. As she’s plunged into the lake of fire, her guardian angel suddenly recalls the single good deed she had done in her lifetime: “She once pulled up an onion in her garden and gave it to a beggar woman!” the guardian angel excitedly tells God, who then instructs him to hold out an onion above the old woman in the lake of fire. “If you can pull her out of the lake, let her come to Paradise, but if the onion breaks, then the woman must stay where she is.” The guardian angel carefully holds the onion out to the woman, and she catches onto it as instructed and has almost been pulled out when the other damned souls, seeing how she’s being lifted up, start to grab her feet so that they can escape too. But the selfish old woman yells, “It’s MY onion, not yours!” and starts kicking her legs wildly, which causes the onion to break, dropping her back into the lake.

Another onion image caught my eye by chance when watching a short feature on NHK (Japanese public TV). The narrator turned to a hōju (宝珠), which is little ‘treasure ball’ that looks a lot like an onion - with a peak on the top - that you sometimes see a Buddha statue holding. She explains that these pointy balls symbolize the Buddhist teachings that illuminate ‘The Way’ and dispel ignorance. They have more recently entered Western pop culture through tattoo imagery to signify things like wish-granting and the alleviation of suffering. This little handheld thing shaped like an ordinary root vegetable is packed with some profound symbolism.

unfired small lidded containers in progress

Through such connections, I, neither Buddhist nor tattooed, have been thinking about this onion-y shape in the context of small acts of kindness, neither grand nor insignificant.

Layers of associations provide a backdrop for considering the nuances of small, everyday pots. In a culture often loudly insistent that art should take a stance or carry an explicit message about the socio-political issues of today, such pots can be hastily dismissed as irrelevant, without anything to say. But some pots dwell persistently in a world of implicit meanings and mysteries, and that’s what I’m interested in.

A couple of days went by, and I was waiting to get my car windshield replaced in Española, when an elderly gentleman came in to the glass repair shop for the same reason and struck up a conversation. He told me he was from Cebolla, adding that most people don’t know where that is. The name rolled off his tongue, ‘Seh-boh-yah.’ Thanks to clay research and to jury duty, both of which have taken me, more than once, on the long drive that goes right through the small village of Cebolla, I not only knew exactly where it was but had, also more than once, wondered who lives there in those out-of-the-way farmhouses set back off the road. “I know where it is. It’s so beautiful there,” I said.

When my windshield was ready and I had paid my bill, this gentleman quickly stood up and walked over to hold open the door to the parking lot for me, which struck me as an unexpected gesture of bygone days. Over dinner that night, I described this encounter to my husband. “Cebolla? That means Onion,” he said.

To initiate what I envision as a shift to a more intentional platform than social media, in a series of short essays I’m opening a window into my studio, briefly sharing what I’m working on and thinking about. I appreciate your taking the time to read this, and expect to send emails three or four times a year, including advance notice of my web store updates.

NEXT TIME I’ll include photos of recent work and an update on the progress of my kiln building.

Happy Spring (or Fall, depending on where you live).

betsy

<image: our crabapple on the verge of flowering

Upcoming Events

June 4, 2024 - Featured Artist with Bianka (née Groves) Apodaca De La Cruz, Tom Jaszczak, and Paul Eschelman: Northern Clay Center (Online and In Person)

August (tbd) 2024 - Yunomi and Teapot Invitational: Clay Akar (Online)

September 13, 2024 - Solo Show: Clay Akar (Online and In Person)

November 2 and 3, 2024 - Dixon Studio Tour: Rift Gallery (In Person)

May 3, 2025 - ‘The Future Imperfect Tense’: Rift Gallery (In Person)

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