It’s difficult to call yourself an artist these days, still be alive, and make a living out of it. Peng Yun is one of the few artists that can put a claim all three of those much-coveted attributes. Born and raised in Taipei, Peng specializes in pottery and enjoys working with clay and glaze. All of his contemporary work is focused on practical uses such as tea sets and kitchenware.
I’ve had the pleasure of spending four days with him at his workshop during his month-long residency at Giant Year Gallery, focusing on contemporary Asian ceramic art, in Hong Kong. Over the weeks, I had the honor to know him on a personal level, so I could understand the motivations behind his artwork. From a writer to a potter, one of the first things I did was to see if we could find some common ground between our art forms.
Immediately after knowing him, we discovered that we both shared a love for the finer things in life such as craft beer, European cheese, and Italian scooters. Maybe dancers and potters and painters are different, but perhaps they share one thing in common – pursuing a life well loved. It is true that we earn less than bankers or doctors, but it’s also true that we never really retire if we work in a field that is a part of our lives.
When asked what the three most important things in life were he joking replied that they were whisky, cigars, and steak. On a more serious note they were the bare essentials; rays of sunshine through clear skies, fresh air, and love. In a modern age where smog and pollution so often obstruct nature’s way of reaching us, sunlight and fresh air have become rare real estate. Our busy lifestyles have also afforded us little in the way of love, love of other people, an appreciation for the environment that we live in, and love of life itself.
Being an artist isn’t about making pretty things and being emotional, it’s about being able to express abstract ideas in concrete ways that the human sensory capacity can process. This could be through poetry, or sculptures, or paintings, or dance, or music, or film, but these are all snapshots of personal emotions and perhaps a snippet of society as we live it today. An archive for future generations to study how we lived life much like Roman architecture, Greek philosophy, Chinese ink paintings, or Persian coinage.
Back to pottery, Peng says that the most volatile part of creating pottery is the kiln.Too hot and it burns all the hard work you’ve put in, too cool and it deforms the creations. You need to have patience to get everything just right. Now I don’t know much about pottery and we didn’t talk too much about pottery, but being an artist means more than getting a degree that translates to unemployment. Art is all around us; the way your smartphone’s hardware interacts with its software, the building you work in, or the tiles in the toilet of your favorite pizza parlor. We need to be patient with ourselves to discover it.
Look up from the screen of your phone when you’re commuting, maybe you’ll appreciate your surroundings even more. Art’s not just for connoisseurs, it’s for everyone.
