Beach House, Spring 2024
This special issue of the Provincetown Independent nudges us into spring on Outer Cape Cod — into the landscape of beach plums and bees; into ceramicists' studios and artists' interiors and gardens; and off on a quest for beach houses where sun and wind inform design.
This special issue of the Provincetown Independent nudges us into spring on Outer Cape Cod — into the landscape of beach plums and bees; into ceramicists' studios and artists' interiors and gardens; and off on a quest for beach houses where sun and wind inform design.
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Provincetown Independent | BEACH / HOUSE | <strong>Spring</strong> <strong>2024</strong> | 15<br />
From the Earth We’re Standing On<br />
Three ceramicists find inspiration in places as diverse as Grandma’s popcorn bowl,<br />
stacks of patterned fabrics, and the clay cliffs of a Wellfleet beach.<br />
By Abraham Storer<br />
The Outer Cape has provided the bedrock of inspiration for ceramicists<br />
Michael Ceraldi, Paul Wisotzky, and Isabel Souza. Ceraldi takes creative<br />
nourishment from this place most literally, gathering clay from local<br />
beaches to create plates for his Wellfleet restaurant. As young ceramicists,<br />
Souza and Wisotzky both nurtured their craft at Castle Hill, where Ceraldi currently<br />
creates and fires his work. They share a commitment to making functional<br />
objects, but that’s about where the similarities end. These three artists<br />
have forged different styles, revealing the malleability of the art form.<br />
Michael Ceraldi<br />
“I try to live from a creative, artistic place. That’s my home. I’ve always<br />
been working in food and making art. Rolling out clay with the<br />
slab roller and rolling out pasta with my pasta machine are pretty<br />
much the same thing.<br />
“When I started doing ceramics here, I heard about the clay deposits<br />
at the beach and I thought about how I could incorporate the<br />
actual earth we’re standing on into my work. I started harvesting<br />
about a half pound of clay at a time and turning that into a slip,<br />
which is like a thick, loose paint with which I’ll coat my plates. The<br />
local clay is a deep gray because of the iron it contains, but when it’s<br />
fired it turns an oxidized rusty color.<br />
“I like to keep the somewhat irregular characteristics of each<br />
piece I make, because that’s a good representation of the earth<br />
and where it comes from. I don’t want to take that away by trying<br />
to laboriously make every edge perfect. I’m inspired by Japanese<br />
ceramics that don’t try to hide what some people might consider<br />
mistakes.”<br />
“I was making a vase and tooling the bottom out and the bottom fell through,” says Michael<br />
Ceraldi. “I thought, ‘How can I utilize this cylinder? It’s kind of like the shape of a drum.’ So, from<br />
there, I started making drums.” (Photos by Agata Storer)<br />
Plates made by Michael Ceraldi with a blue salt glaze and clay from a Wellfleet beach.<br />
Paul Wisotzky<br />
“I started making pots when I was at Lexington High School. I had a<br />
great teacher. She was the first teacher who showed me that I could<br />
actually be good at something. My parents had a summer home in<br />
Truro, and I started taking classes at Castle Hill when I was a teenager.<br />
I did it in college a little bit, but I stopped, and I had another<br />
life for 20 or 25 years.<br />
“I always wanted to be a potter. I moved here in 2007. Now’s<br />
the time, I thought, and I did it.<br />
“I glaze my work in atmosphere kilns, which is where the atmosphere<br />
has an impact on the glaze surface and the clay surface.<br />
One of the things I love about atmospheric firing is that it gives the<br />
kiln the last say. I can’t control the atmosphere consistently, so it<br />
will impact the surface of the pot differently in each firing. Most of<br />
the time, it’s a good final say, but occasionally it’s not — that’s the<br />
beauty of it.<br />
“I have a specific decorating technique. I’m inspired by looking<br />
at patterns on fabric, in architecture, or in graphic design. I<br />
design sponge stamps on the computer and fabricate them with a<br />
laser cutter. I then use the sponge stamps to decorate my pottery<br />
through wax resist, kind of like batik.”<br />
Wisotzky decorates his ceramics with sponge stamps and a wax resistant technique.<br />
Paul Wisotzky in his Truro studio.