Working in Maui this winter and finding many new great volcanic clays to make pottery... most are found near the beaches where erosion is visible. It has been interesting to find clays in so many areas most firing in the brown to terra cota range.

Check out the collaborative art project we just completed and will be available in April 2011 exclusively through Newton Vineyard. Its called the "Element wine chiller" made from clay harvested at Newtons Carneros Vineyard in Napa California. This chiller is the collaborative effort between Michael Wisner and Newton Vineyard. The piece is a reflection of Newtons incredible Spring Mountain hillside estate. Sculpturally the V shape represents the mountainous terrain of Napa mountain range. Patterns were inspired by the elegant and sensual shape of Newtons unfiltered chardonnay bottle and pressed into the chillers surface creating a rythm and pattern that resonates with Newtons principle of working in collaboration with Nature. Newton is unique in Napa in that they choose to use old world unfiltered winemaking techniques that is intstilled with a wisdom that knows that when you allow nature to collaborate in the wine making process there is a synergy that takes place that produces a wine finer then is possible through mans hands alone.Many processes at Newton are left to nature and watched over by Chris the master wine crafter who judiciously collaborates with the process until has reached its pinnacle. Nerwton saw a parallel in Michaels art process and felt there would be a natural fit in our working together to produce a limited edition are series. I hope you will enjoy seeing what we created. There are one hundred signed chiller and coaster sets available at newton vineyard.

Michael Wisner
Evolving
Tradition
Article by D Wood
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Ceramics: Art and Perception No. 63 2006 75
THE MOGOLLON ARE REGARDED AS THE EARLIEST
potters of the American southwest, a civilisation
dating from 350 BC – 1150 AD; by 850 AD.
Their neighbours, the Anasazi, were making cooking
pots with impressed repeat patterns, called corrugations
at the same time. The last culture known to have
made corrugated pots was the Salado (1075 – 1400
AD) in central Arizona. Then this type of decoration
in the region largely gave way to painting. Until
Michael Wisner.
Comparing a Wisner pot with one of the ancient
specimens creates a list of similarities: an overall ordered
pattern with seamless beginning and end; a
repeated motif that creates hypnotic lines around,
across and down the vessel; a thin-walled clay body
formed by means of coils; natural colours; and classic
forms. The comparison might prompt the conclusion
that Wisner set out to copy his predecessors. He did,
in some ways, yet the unique woven patterns for
which he has gained renown came about by accident.
Wisner's development as a potter comprises a
number of links to native traditions in the southwestern
US and Mexico. For a man who grew up on
the Chesapeake Bay in Maryland, he has imbued and
been embraced by cultures that, until about 18 years
ago, were as alien to him as those of another planet.
That he has been admitted to those cultures is a testament
to his openness and quest for an authentic basis
for his own art.
When Michael Wisner contemplated his future
upon completion of high school, he knew that although
he enjoyed drawing and was skilled at it, an
education in science would lead to a job. With his
mother’s financial help he graduated from college
and began employment in a pharmaceutical company.
In 1988, as a gesture to repay her assistance,
Wisner planned a mother/son vacation to the American
southwest where they visited museums and ruins
in Colorado, Arizona and New Mexico. As the trip
progressed, Wisner became increasingly fascinated
with the Mimbres and Anasazi pottery. He was
drawn to the intensity of the painted geometric patterns
and his mother remarked, “these remind me of
the drawings you used to do as a kid”.
After resuming his job on the east coast, Wisner
sought local experts who could show him how to
replicate the antiquities. There were none. Unwilling
to let the memory go, he taught himself handbuilding
during months of late nights and tried to recreate
what he’d seen in order to “have a connection to these
things that were so beautiful.” Shortly thereafter,
much to his mother’s chagrin, Wisner quit his job and,
with the aim of indulging what had by now become
an obsession, made his way west to learn more.
With the ski slopes of Snowmass Village, Colorado,
as a base, he studied with native potters in Arizona
and New Mexico and then travelled to ISOMATA
(Idyllwild School of Music and the Arts) in California.
With no pressing commitments elsewhere, Wisner
volunteered as a workshop assistant for the summer
session of 1989 and became part of classes taught by
Lucy Lewis, Blue Corn and Fannie Nampeyo, illustrious
masters of the Southwest Native tradition. Also
that summer, Nicolás Quezada filled in for his
brother, Juan, and Wisner had his first exposure to
Mata Ortiz. “It was just enough to know I had to go
there and study more.”
Wisner describes why he was attracted to the techniques
of Mata Ortiz: “In Mata Ortiz they looked for
quality whereas Native Americans, sadly, had lost
some of that through the past couple of hundred
years. The indigenous pottery had become a commercial
ware, no longer based on function. It didn’t need
to have the same integrity or strength as functional
artwork so they did just enough to make it saleable for
decoration. But Juan Quezada was and still is concerned
with quality. That drew me in as well as the
refinement – he had taken southwest pottery to a
whole new level.” And Wisner wasn’t the only one
who held this opinion: “Any American Indian would
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76 Ceramics: Art and Perception No. 63 2006
say the same thing. They revered Juan for what he
had achieved. He has an incredible genius that
nobody denied or seemed to be jealous of; they celebrated
the fact that there was somebody alive that
they could all learn from.”
That year, driving straight from California to
northern Chihuahua, Mexico, Wisner knocked on
Juan Quezada’s door for the first time. Although
Quezada was precluded from teaching, due to a contract
with Fuji Corporation, he agreed to a week of
lessons after which Wisner just stayed on. “I watched
and at the time I had no Spanish at all – I knew the
cuss words that every kid knows – but I didn’t have
any ability with the language. I quickly reverted to a
child-like disposition where I couldn’t communicate
with adults and I followed people around. I became
like the village idiot but Juan was gracious, he let me
be the village idiot. And it made me notice how much
higher education gets in the way of learning. I was so
used to articulating everything, coming from a word
world, and there I was reduced to a visual world. I
was amazed at how much I learnt, in a different way,
because I relied on my sight alone.”
Wisner adopted the learning methods of his surroundings:
“What interested me was that the Mexicans
learn like that as well. They haven’t been
through a rigorous education system – they don’t
think the way we do and they don’t learn like we do.
They’ll sit around and watch for days and all of a sudden
they’ve got it. Not a lot of questions. When I teach
now I notice that people who have a simpler educational
background just watch and get it.”
The Quezadas incorporated Wisner into their family
for a month on that first visit, sharing their meals
and giving him a bedroom. In the subsequent 15 years
he has been back for more than two years altogether.
During winters Wisner worked in the Colorado
ski industry, initially as an instructor
and later as a chef, but every fall and
spring he was welcomed into the
environs of Mata Ortiz. Each session
focused on mastering a new technique.
“At first it seemed like an
insurmountable mountain because
there was so much to learn.” But broken
down into achievable portions –
blackware, polychrome, polishing, firing
– Wisner accomplished his goals and
eventually arrived at the point of asking
himself, “What do I do now? I’m not Mexcian,
I’m not Indian. At first I wanted to master
the techniques just to see if I could but I didn’t want
to be in competition with people whose tradition I
had adopted.” Juan and his wife, Guille, were also
concerned. “Polite as they were, sometimes they
would sit me down and say ‘what are you going to
do?’ They would team up and have a kind of family
talk.” Wisner began to seek his own voice, a way to
add a new dimension to the Quezada legacy.
“Once you feel you have mastery, you can start
expressing the things you are passionate about. My
father was a marine biologist and as a kid I had exposure
to that. So I started doing aquatic scenes and
marine life – for a long time I painted whales, fish, dolphins
on pots. I painted for years in this manner and
invented new colour and geometric patterns not seen
before in southwest design. In addition I was consciously
trying to use new forms.”
Wisner enjoyed the way his work was progressing
and though he was not seeking change, his ongoing
research unearthed the revelation that would alter his
direction. “Throughout history, potters have always
pressed things into clay: ropes or leaves or shells. The
Anasazi women pressed their fingertips in a systematic
way around a pot. I tried this, just out of curiosity
and it caught me. I thought, this is something new,
something different. Overnight I dropped painting
and went completely into texturing.”
With this move Wisner further immersed his aesthetic
in the historical precedents of the southwest.
His construction techniques derive from Mata Ortiz, a
genre inseparable from its founder and revered practitioner.
The legend of Juan Quezada describes how
Juan was inspired to replicate the prehistoric pottery
of the Casas Grandes peoples. He discovered potsherds
dating from 1100 to 1450 AD and through
careful examination and years of trial and error, developed
renditions that he felt were faithful to the
quality evident in the relics of his ancestors. Juan then
taught his family and friends in the village of Mata
Ortiz and later passed on the legacy to interested students
such as Wisner.
Mata Ortiz pots are constructed from local clay by
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Ceramics: Art and Perception No. 63 2006 77
means of the coil and
pinch method. Minerals
such as iron oxide
and manganese provide
colour variations
and after the
pottery dries in the
sun, it is polished to
ensure a flawless surface
for decorating. Wisner
perpetuates this manufacturing
custom even to the
extent that he digs clay that he discovers
while on his bicycle or hiking excursions in the
Colorado mountains. His vessels are typical of the
work of Juan’s disciples, deviating from the originals
in that his are fired in an electric or gas kiln.
“At first, I used my finger as a pressing device and
then I considered using something more refined to
repeat the pattern with more precision. I started
making metal tools and I now have about 35 or 40
different ones that I’ve developed over the past four
years.” The realisation that a device as simple as a
fingernail could be artistic was transformative.
“This was a turning point because it released a whole
new level of energy, a new avenue. And it was doubly
exciting because I knew I was finally fulfiling the
quest of all artists, to find something that hasn’t been
seen before. For me, it wasn’t solely about trying to
do something new, it was about listening to what
was going on inside and expressing it; testing my
instincts and intuition and doing what I believed
was exciting.”
The marriage of inner concerns and interests with
outer expression derives from Wisner’s belief in
Tibetan Buddhism. “I practise meditation and I think
that what’s inside is not a whole lot different than
what we start to express outside. When I teach I try to
convey the importance of paying attention. Throughout
your day, notice what gets your attention and
then use those things as sources for your art.” Lately,
his Buddhism has been overtly manifest. “I’ve started
working on big bowls – I’ve called them mandalas
because they look like Tibetan mandalas. In Tibetan
Buddhism vision is a primary means of gaining focus
in the mind. If you look at a mandala and continually
stare at it, the repetitive patterns draw attention
inward. The more you look at it, the more layers you
start to see.” In Wisner’s mandalas, “the pattern
starts quite large and goes down to small pinpoints.
What I love is that I do so little towards the finished
pattern. I make my marks but so much happens with
secondary or tertiary patterns and negative space.
Sometimes, when I’m working, I assume that the patterns
won’t link up but the best results are those that I
initially doubted.”
Juan Quezada is pleased that his protégé has found
his niche and has speculated that, with the permutations
and combinations that 40 tools afford him, Wisner
has a lifetime of work ahead. This fatherly approval
is cherished, as is the support of another significant
influence on Wisner’s career, Anderson Ranch. Since
he has no formal art training (except the essential
apprenticeship with Quezada), exposure to the
Ranch’s international roster of ceramics artists has provided
him with further observations relevant to his
craft. Doug Casebeer, the Ranch’s Program Director
for ceramics and sculpture, “has been unwavering in
his support. I’ve made pots full-time for seven years.
For the first three or four years I was cooking at night
and making pots in the day. When I finally quit my
cooking job, Doug said ‘it’s about time. I’ve been
telling you to do this for about five years.’ I didn’t
believe him. He always invites me back and is
encouraging. It’s rare to find someone who is that
supportive.”
Michael Wisner feels fortunate to be able to do what
he loves and make a living at it. He credits his success
to the genius of Juan Quezada, not only in influencing
hundreds of people but in his encouragement of individual
creativity. Yet Wisner can certainly be
accorded a ranking on his own: he has explored and
emulated ancient traditions of the Americas and Asia;
he has adapted venerable techniques to his own ends;
and he has experimented with and adjusted primitive
processes so that his students in urban environments
can follow their own paths. He is a testament to the
wisdom of Thomas Edison who said that genius is
one percent inspiration, ninety-nine percent perspiration.
In Wisner’s words, “The process is fascinating:
finding something, refining it, and then making
something of it. It is completely laborious.” Evolution
is usually that way.
D Wood is a design instructor in Tuscon, AZ, and a freelance
writer specialising in fine craft.
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