Saturday, December 5, 2009

Sid Luck at Stagville

Well, Stagville sucked for sales, but the company was great! Met some nice folks today but the weather could not have been worse. Stagville is a historic plantation and we were supposed to be spread out on the grounds in and around the plantation house, which is the whole reason I agreed to do this show in the first place. I love being at these places. But today was bitter cold, windy and raining, so they moved us inside to the visitor's center. You know the building if you have ever visited any museum shops. Small, bright light and they had to squeeze six artists in this space. I was right beside Sid Luck, Seagrove Potter, many of you know him well.He is the nicest man you will ever meet, but a hard act to follow. Not to mention a bit intimidating for me to be beside as a potter who has no traditional pottery background. The coolest thing about it though was this: in 2002, Sid was doing a workshop at the local Parks and Rec where I lived and I went. He is the first person to ever put a ball of clay in my hand and I was hooked from that moment on. How ironic to be next to him eight years later at a show. He was doing demos and telling tells and the visitors were eating it up, then walking right over to his table and buying up all of those traditional Seagrove pots, $9 blue mugs, they were very nice. My temmoku mugs were $15 which I thought was cheap and I sold none. Do you think anyone at that place today had a clue what Raku was or temmoku? I guarantee you if I had my Raku kiln there and was pulling shit out of it, I would have sold some, but noooooo, I sold those f-ing Christmas ornaments that I DO NOT like to make. But if I didn't make them, then I would have no sales at shows like this. So, moral of the story, I need to STOP doing shows like this, right? So, Matt Grimmitt, I'm right there with ya on the piss show experience. The only good part, was visiting with Sid and his lovely wife all day, and the other good thing for the day, was getting a really great email from Steven Forbes deSoule which brightened my day greatly and gave me encouragement to get up, brush myself off and get on with it. He didn't know the day I had, but the email sure helped lift my spirits. Thanks, Steven, if you are reading this!!!!!

3 comments:

Matt Grimmitt said...

Oh Tracey, not you too! You just can't win can you. I decide not to do a show yesterday because the location looks crappy and it turns out that it was Tigs busiest show ever and every soap dish that was put out sold, doh!

Tracey Broome said...

It's so hard to figure out, isn't it Matt? The things I don't really like that much always sell, the things I love never do. I stopped doing a show that was held in a high school gym where they put a blue plastic tarp on the floor to protect it, I just hated that environment,although I really liked the people involved, and I heard yesterday that they had good sales, in spite of the weather.One of these days something will go right, I just know it!

Jen Mecca said...

Isn't it just the pits when sales are bad...but misery loves companys I'm glad you had some of that!