First, knowing Bobbi as I do, we talked about our family and how it has impacted her art. Can you explain how your family has affected your choices as an artist?

   Well, if it wasn't for my family, I never would have become an artist. The influences have been enormous with my mother, Lois Need, being an artist, and my stepfather, Al Need, an artist, and my real father, Bill Dailey, a fine wildlife artist, and, of course, having the family/studio gallery in Mendocino. Between the ages of 13 and 17, I was interested in many medium —theater, music, dance, ballet. For a long time, I flipped around from one thing to another but ended up enjoying working with clay the most.There was a lot of encouragement from the family to be creative and the materials were made available to us.

What triggered your interest in clay?

  When I was around 14, Mother had a studio set up so I had the clay and the wheel available. It seemed more of a solitary endeavor. Theater and dance always had lots of people involved and things happening around you. If you played music, you had to perform in front of a crowd and I didn't like performing. I did it, but can't say it was great.

I don't remember you being shy. In my thinking you were always outgoing. You sang and played the guitar for everyone, things like that.

It's true, though, ask anybody in the family. I was a quiet, sulky child and cried a lot. From when I was born to when I was about 12, I was a mess! I cried and sulked and brooded. If a teacher talked to me, I cried. I hardly ever said anything.  So, theater and dance and music served to push me out of myself. I was definitely a different person after those experiences, but my true nature is to work in solitude. I found that solitude while working with clay.

Do you remember your first art piece?

   It's hard to remember the first piece, but I do remember my first weed pot that actually got fired and glazed. I liked it. I think I was 15 at the time. I gave it to Betty Goodman who I worked for in the local bookstore in Mendocino. She displayed it in the store window. That's the one that comes to mind. I remember how proud I was with that little thrown pot. I was feeling very pleased with it. It was all Mom's clay and glazes and her kiln, but I remember thinking, Ah, I made something beautiful! And that was encouraging. It wasn't like a song that you sing and then it's over and done, or a dance that you danced, or a play you acted in, it gave me that possibility of Oh, here it is, it's still here—something you don't get with performing arts because when they're done they're gone and you don't have them again.

So, you found something tangible or real to show for your efforts?

   Yes, at that point, it was very important to me—to have some validity, something tangible and solid to help identify who I was. It felt really great because up until then, I felt like I didn't really have an identity.

You had equal opportunity to get into painting and ceramics, so why ceramics?

   Well, with Dad (Al Need) being a painter, I also had painting materials available, but, of course, Dad being who he was, that wasn't as available. But, really, I never had the desire to touch painting. I was drawn to the clay, instead.

When I started with clay I was living with you and the family in Mendocino when they owned the gallery with the potters wheel in the middle of the room in the Gallery Fair building. I remember the frustration I felt when I could not center a ball of clay on the wheel. It took me two years just to learn how to center. One day in a fit of pure frustration, I ripped the blob of clay off the wheel and threw the wet messy clay across the gallery floor. Of course, it splattered all over the walls and paintings, and Dad became very angry with me! I don't know if I wasn't strong enough or what, but I thought, if I have to struggle to center a ball of clay on the wheel, then this is definitely not my thing!

Some people just have an ease about it and some people don't. It's actually not a strength thing, you know. It's about balance. You're just moving the very outside of the clay, the inside is already centered. And to get that in your mind is difficult. You're trying to push the whole thing, but you're not, actually, you're just working the outside of the lump of clay.

The inside is already centered? I had never thought of it that way before. That makes so much sense.

Yeah, I've used that idea in my teaching. Another thing I tell my students is to treat the clay like a butterfly wing—very gently because it's fragile.

I think of clay as being less fragile and more malleable or flexible. Is there something about this fragility that drew you to working with clay?

That's exactly why you have to treat it so delicately, because it is so malleable and flexible. When its wet, every mark you put on—or every touch—is a mark, so if you want to keep the clay fresh and spontaneous, you have to treat it very lightly, delicately. Painting is the same way. The freshness is what gives it life. You can overwork a piece, but it depends on what you're trying to achieve.

I've worked on projects where it's been worked and worked and worked to get a particular affect, in fact those lamps behind you have been worked to death. It's a particular style and something I wanted to know how to do— how to work by pushing the clay out and pushing it in. After the pot was thrown on the wheel, while it was still wet enough, I pushed out from the inside with my fingers and pushed in from the outside. It was not spontaneous or easy. I was pushing in and working out, with some carving—not a spontaneous gesture. I just had to keep working until I got what I wanted.

   For instance, this vase—that's spontaneous, very fresh—its been pushed out from the top. What I want to do is have that kind of energy and spontaneity evident in my large sculptures, where I can wet down and when I push in, there's a softness, like a brush stroke. I don't like to add anything to the surface. I like the life of a piece to come from the inside out, instead of adding on.

Can you tell me about where you studied or who you have studied with?

Actually, I haven't taken any classes. I took one mask workshop after I hurt my back. But the making of pottery started with my mother, and then later when I lived with a potter, Richard, for three or four years. Richard and I bought land in the Pigmy Forest in Mendocino, built a huge brick whale kiln, and made pots. Our studio space was beautiful around it, a nice spot to work. We were both involved full time making pots. Richard had a trust fund so neither of us worked at regular jobs, but still, we lived very poorly, eating beans and rice, which wasn't too bad!

The kiln was fired with wood. We slept next to it because it took two nights to fire with two cords of wood. It was really a beautiful kiln, shaped like a whale. The stack was at the tail end. We fed the wood at the mouth end, and the air vents looked like whale teeth. And at each side you'd put in wood. The bag wall was right behind that and you'd have to crawl in and stand up to load it with pots.

Is that like the Japanese kilns?

Chinese. That's a Chinese kiln.

So it's not one of those kilns that climbs the hillside?

Well, that's a hill climbing kiln. That's Japanese. That has several chambers. Each chamber is loaded up and then bricked up. The fire boxes are all along the way as you go up.

So your whale kiln only had one fire box?

Yeah, two sides—the eyes of the whale.

How big was it?

Ah, let's see, cubic foot-wise, it was about 150 cubic feet. Gigantic.

And you could actually stand up in it?

Oh yeah.

How long did it take you to get enough pieces to fire such a large kiln?

Well, we only fired it a few times. And after I left that relationship, the kiln was taken down.

You mentioned the name Sasha in your website biography. Can you tell me how he influenced your work?

    Sasha is a potter that lives in Mendocino. As I remember, I took one evening class with him. I remember because he made a handle for a pot by pulling it from his forehead and I thought that was the funniest thing I'd ever seen! It was only one class with just us friends. We got together and had fun at the art center one evening. He and his wife also bought land in the Pigmy Forest next door to Richard and me. They built a kiln and studio and worked there, so I saw a lot of his work. I was mostly influenced by his process. He was very intuitive with the clay and innovative. It's like he let the clay just flow up, you know and his glazes were always refined, very soft, almost non-existent glaze.

His type of work wasn't that inspiring to me. His pieces were much softer, more undulating. Delicate. And my work was more Japanese, more controlled and probably had more intent than Sasha's.

Is his influence visible in your work today?

No.

There were actually three male artists that influenced me. Sasha, Jack Sears, who also was involved in the Pigmy Forest group, in fact, Richard, Jack and another potter all bought land together. And Sasha lived next door. So there were actually four potters I was around, all in the same area.

What kind of work did Jack Sears do?

Well, his work is more like mine than Sasha's —much stronger. Jack was married to Marty, also a potter who did very delicate work.

Richard's work had a more rustic quality. I always liked that.

Your work used to look rustic and now it seems a smoother, more refined.

Well because I'm using a smaller electric kiln right now. I don't have the big gas fired kiln any longer. The small kiln has changed my whole way of working. The reduction—I'm doing oxidation now. The surface with a reduction high fire is a glaze that goes into the clay body, whereas with an electric kiln and oxidation the glaze stays on the surface and becomes more glass-like. I did pit firing for many years but it's low fire and the pots were not that durable. You can't put the pieces outside. So I'm changing my whole way of working.

Who else has influenced you?

Brad Perry impressed me. I like his glaze technique. When I was living in Paradise, I worked at the art center, teaching. He came in at that time. I've known him for thirty years, and he shows at our gallery. He definitely influenced my work. Then and now. Although I don't do impressions in the clay like he does, I like the texture.

Also Sophia, she influenced me more in the sculptural sense. I felt like I could do something similar to what she was doing. Something innovative.

Her work is figurative, fairly fluid, not precise. Abstracted from representational subject matter.

Yes, it was inspiring to see her work because she was innovative and abstract and it's soft and fluid, and even though I wouldn't go to that extent of articulation of body parts, like with the penis, the rib cage and tummy, she has a lot of humor to her work. I don't. For some reason, I'm serious with my work. I have a great sense of humor, but it doesn't seem to come out in the work. I'm not sure why.

Have you tried?

Well, those movable heads had humor and I found myself laughing a lot.Their expressions weren't necessarily that humorous, but when you moved a head in different directions the expressions changed and made one laugh.

How has your mother's work influenced you?

And of course my mother influenced me with her way of keeping the work going. She kept it going while raising a family of five.

Can you tell me a little about your subject matter and content? Where do you get your ideas?

Much of the content of my work depends on what I'm going through in my life. It is directly related, however, sometimes it's not that evident to me until the show is underway. You don't really know exactly what it means until you are well into it.

I suppose I'm fortunate to have a gallery to show and sell my work. I choose the type of show I want to have.

The Feminine View show, with the movable heads, was done after my divorce. It was about having the feminine view, knowing what it is, and being a part of that. At the time, I needed to reconnect with that sense of being a woman, to be in the world again after my divorce, and to draw on its strength, knowing that I was strong enough to be on my own. It was an important show for me because it was the first time I've actually produced sculptures on that scale, and oddly enough, it happened very spontaneously. There was a woman that bowed out of a show and I had to fill the spot. Within a month, I had the pieces done.

But you already had the concept formed in your mind?

Yes absolutely. And I had done shoulder pieces, but not the full figure pieces.

The next show, the Dunes, which was the first show Ron and I did together, was about being connected to the earth, about where we live on Salmon Creek, a whole new place, feeling, structure.

Can you describe how that sense of place is reflected in your pottery?

 It was moving the clay so it looked very soft, fluid, like a sand dune. It was a very exciting process because, before, I used to Sumi paint on the pots and I loved the freshness of the flowing ink and its energy and not being attached to making it perfect. Doing this in a sculptural way can keep the clay fresh. This was a very successful show for Ron and I. It was nice doing a show where you integrated the work, it wasn't just about me, it was about us, the gallery, what would sell, the whole picture.

The next show Ron and I did together was called Figuratively Speaking. Also about the feminine view. My daughter, Maya, was our model. With this show I went through problem after problem. We pulled the show off, but it didn't reflect my intent. I had to be happy or content with what was going on with the clay body and glazes. The process is different with each type of work that I do. I do small pieces which are basically pinched. And I do large pieces which are slabs, and the slabs need to be set up. I work with two different types of clay, so it all depends on the type of work I'm doing and the clay body I'm using.

The clay for these pieces would dry out and get too hard because I had to work at my other job, so when I finally got back to a piece, the clay was too hard to manipulate. I tried to rewet it but then it became too wet and the pieces collapsed. Then the clay wouldn't hold a glaze!

This was a direct result of not having the time because you are also working at a regular day job?

Right. And I may not have done it even if I had had the time. I don't really know. I can't say, if only I had the time, I would have made them look beautiful.

What I did was throw the head, and then roll out two large 1/4 inch slabs, shape and attach the slabs, cover it and then come back. Usually, I'd have only an hour or two to work at one sitting. Once it firmed up a bit, I'd seal it all up with wet rags, then wet it again to push out the arms and legs, and whatever parts I wanted, then let it set up again, then attach the head, which I couldn't do first because my hand had to go inside to push out for the arms and legs. It was a lot of drying and wetting, drying and wetting, and being attentive to the moisture of the clay. I think that if I could have stayed with a piece long enough, I would have gotten more into the rhythm of it. Sometimes I wouldn't get back to making art for a couple of days and then I'd lose the momentum

Describe how you get from point A to point B?

Well, if it's a large piece, I roll out the slab, throw the head on the wheel, then I have to wait a day. It's put together initially. Once its upright and in position it gets wet down and covered up. Then I push out from the inside to make the extremities and then attach the head. Then it gets worked from the outside.

Eventually, which I didn't do as much with this last series, I want to push the clay from the outside in, with a sharp tool to make a strong line that looks like a Sumi stroke. You see the line, where the dress is—it's been manipulated pretty well. What I really want is to take a stick and go whooof! from the outside, so what you see is a spontaneous gesture, not stiff and overworked, not controlled. I want it to be softened up. That's my intent. There's a fluidity with the work that I want to keep.

Is it possible to create that sense of fluidity and not at the same time accept those little things that happen that may be wrong? In other words, is it contradictory to simultaneously have spontaneity and control? Is it trying to do something which is, possibly, inherently contrary to the nature of clay?

No, I did it with the pots. It's just with this particular structure, to wet it down where its stable enough where you want to put that line, you have to be damn sure that you know where that line is going to go. The pots were spontaneous. I just did it. But when working with a figure, a wrong line can throw the whole feeling of the figure off, and could cause it to look distorted or clumsy, awkward.

So, that's the game of getting those lines right. Structurally, the piece has got integrity, but artistically, it is stiff. Too structured, too worked out, so that's what I'm working on.

It's a balance. One of the reason's I'm working on that is because, I think, personally, I don't want to be in control of things that happen around me that much, I want it to be just a natural course of things that go with what's going on.

But in order to do that, you have to let go of the end product, you have to let things happen and accept what happens, don't you?

Right. You have to let go, but there is a balance of intent and spontaneity and how those two things come together to make a happening good and working, whether it's with a relationship or your environment or having a show for somebody in the gallery—that intent or the knowledge that you come to a project with, whether it be your own or somebody else's—if you're in too much control, you lose, but if you have no control, you lose too. Its always this balance of how much you are willing to give up and how much you're going to let other influences come in.

But structurally (with this work), obviously, I wasn't able to give up that much, because I was working and needed to get them done. I wanted to do this idea of the full figures in Figuratively Speaking, but it was probably beyond my ability to go in this direction. Then again, if I never did it, I wouldn't know what happens when you're not in that place where you can let go and have things happen, let those accidents happen, and let the spontaneity create the piece. To me its process, whether these pieces are works of art or good works of art became not the point.

The point was the process and that I was working. It's unfortunate that I have to make a living, and didn't have the time to put into these! They weren't received well.

That's disappointing.

Yeah, it was, but understandable. And even though I loved my first pieces and thought this is it, I've got it, I'm truckin' now, the more I got into it, I realized I didn't have it. They weren't that great. But what was wonderful was that I allowed my self to go there, to do it.

Only if you do that can you take the next step.

That's right. And I do know what the next step is, I'm not ready for it now, but through this next show I'm working out my clay body, which was part of the whole problem. I had used a sculpture mix and it didn't hold a glaze, so I had to spray paint the pieces afterwards.

You're talking about the quality of the clay?

The quality of the clay has a lot to do with the how it can be manipulated. This clay body was strong, but it wasn't flexible or soft enough, and it was too late in the game to change what I was using or to do any more fooling around. I just had to go with it.

Now, I'm doing small pieces to experiment with clay body, adding a white sculpture mix and a Navajo wheel to the mix, and getting something very dark and rich. Forget the glazes! See what I can come up with by adding softness and darkness to the clay mix, and not doing a high fire, but a middle range cone firing.

So it's all process, one thing after another, wading through, figuring out what the next step is.

Between throwing pots on the wheel and sculpting them from slabs, which do you prefer?

I'm enjoying that I have skills in both. I want to continue integrating the throwing with slab work. Down the road, I can envision more of the body parts being thrown larger in addition to using slab pieces. I intend to get back to working large, doing pieces 3 or 4 feet tall.

Can you work that big without using some kind of armature?

Of course. Its just a matter of knowing how to set them up, when to put them together, all in the wetness and dryness of the clay. I can see throwing different parts and adding them to the slab, like I did with the heads on the earlier pieces for the Feminine View. The work has evolved through natural progression because of specific needs. And, of course, who I am as a person.

So, what's your next project?

The next show Ron and I are doing is called Face the Land and Sea, and my son Justin will be the model. The pieces will be small and abstracted from photos of him, with earth tones, no glaze, and this time I'll do a bronze sculpture. It'll be my first bronze. I'm excited about that. The sculptures will be about 4 - 6 inches in height, probably, integrated with natural materials like rocks and wood.

My intent is to bring man closer to the land instead of destroying it. I don't want to offend anybody, so I want to put it in a way where it is pleasurable to see all the positive things that men do in their energy. To be on the land, working the land, like my son is doing now, is a very positive good thing, instead of being in your head, manipulating, focusing on things that are not connected, like on money, etc. Justin is now working for the State Parks & Recreation Department with a crew doing trail maintenance. He's out doors all the time, looking at the surf, and he gets three months off every year!

How did you begin making masks?

It came about after I hurt my back and I couldn't work on the wheel anymore. We went to Alaska and saw the Canadian Indian masks on our way back. I loved them. I have my first mask in my bedroom. I took my one and only mask making workshop in Gualala several years ago.

When you make them do you start with a preconceived idea of the expression you want on the face?

Because I do them commercially, there were a few that I had fun with and let them evolve in a certain way, but in general the masks are intuitively introverted. They're all very quiet. Meditative. They are that way because that's what I have to learn to do right now for myself—learn to be meditative and reflective. The eyes of the masks are closed, everything is shut down, because it's what I need to do in my life—shut down, not put myself out all the time doing, doing, doing. I'm not quite there yet but…

Did you know it was going to be this reflection of your need to be quiet and meditative?

No. The eyes just weren't open. If I made them open, they were wrong. They didn't look good or feel right.

It's also about how it integrates with the world too, because when you're trying to make money with your artwork, it's about you and the work, but its really just as much about how other people in the world relate to your work.

So, is it important that the viewer respond to your work in the way you intend?

Well, it doesn't necessarily have to be to the way I intend. I hope each piece will evoke some emotional response in the viewer. Through an emotional response there is a relationship between the viewer and the work. The work may trigger an emotion or a memory. To make pieces that can reach as many people as possible on that level is very intriguing and something I think about. So whether the pieces are birds or human forms or pots, what I want is emotion. That's the only thing that's fulfilling. You know, everything else is just transitory—money comes, money goes.

But, the viewer's emotion may be different from what you intended to evoke?

Sure. So that's where detachment comes in. Once the piece is out there, it doesn't matter whether the emotional response is what you intended or not, but the more people you reach, the more fulfilling it is.

You started the gallery in 1986? What was the original concept for the gallery?

Yes. In 1986 I had a show with a friend in that space and people liked the pottery. This was when my father was living with me. The owners offered us the space for only ninety-five dollars a month. We figured we could afford it. Dad sat gallery. He had students in, he taught, and it gave him place to be, something to do, a reason to be involved. I did the weekends and put together all the shows.

It's evolved over the years from a family gallery to being a combination of the Quercia Gallery and Family Gallery. It was The Balcony for a while when it was just me, and then Ron and I got together with his gallery. When we got married we decided to keep his name for the gallery, since his name had more recognition than mine did in the community.

And his focus was on regional California artists? The Quercia Gallery

Right. So through his 50 artists that he had downstairs in his place, we chose 12 to have upstairs as a collective. Not a co-op, because they didn't pay into the gallery except when they had a show. They didn't pay to be a part of the gallery. We would get together and discuss ideas for shows, but that's fallen apart now. There's no more collective.

For the last four years we've been working up to having one person shows with the artists. Some people bowed out that couldn't handle the shows and we felt we couldn't promote anybody that couldn't put together a full show. It meant they weren't really working at their work to the extent that it would take, and once those people bowed out, it changed the whole structure.

Now, the year before a show, we're advertising the upcoming artists. That way we get accustomed to their work, learn about it, talk about it, and promote them for a year before the show is hung. We have six shows a year.

What are some of the rewards of owning the gallery?

You're involved with other people, artists, the world, and you feel like you are doing good promoting people and their work, showing artwork that you believe in, hopefully, and if you don't believe in the work, at least you believe in the person. There are varied levels of work that come about, but the gallery is that place where you can feel part of something. And I think that everybody needs that. Isolation is the worst thing that anybody could ever go through.

Do the other artists have an influence on your work?

I suppose they do. I can't pinpoint anything in particular. But when I was making heavy gold pieces, most of the artists didn't like them, so I felt apologetic. Hardly anybody in the collective liked that work. That was pretty interesting!

Maybe that's one of the drawbacks of owning a gallery, your artwork isn't taken seriously by the others.

Right, because you're a gallery owner and not a "full time artist."

Are there other drawbacks?

Yeah, the amount of time and work and no money. The amount of work is tremendous, every six weeks tearing down shows to put together a new show. With every show there's the image and text on the announcement to be published, the press release, the long version for the statement, and the web site that needs to be gotten together, the pulling down of a show, the painting of the gallery, making food for the reception, greeting all the people, acting intelligent, and I'm exhausted!! Every six weeks! And I'm working on preparing two shows while putting one show up on the wall. Plus I have a job. A lot of work.

You don't think that a show every six weeks is a bit much?

We tried every two months a few times. It seemed a little far apart and people forgot about us.

So to continually generate interest in the gallery you need to have more shows, for a shorter length of time? Create more reasons for people to come. Other activities.

Yes, it generates more interest and plus we're so far away from the main stream, if we don't have a special show and an opening, people won't come out.

You used to have a life drawing and sculpture session, Tai Chi class, and other activities going on in the gallery space.

Yes, but I don't do anything else any more. Its enough just to deal with the gallery and putting shows together. I've thought about it, the life drawing and that sort of thing, but I just can't do all of it at the moment. At least, not until I can figure out how I don't have to work to earn a living!

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Bobbi Jeanne Quercia | Ann T. Pierce