Edith Cauchi: Sculpture in
Ceramics |
Edith Cauchi devoted thirty
years of her life to ceramic art. When she and her husband Joe Cauchi
moved from New York City to Bethel, Connecticut in 1949 they immediately
redesigned an old rural farm building into an art studio. Within a few
months, Edith proudly launched Turkey
Plain Pottery, named after the nearby local Turkey Plain
Road. With a modest sign on the highway and a few business cards, Edith
began to create original pottery designs - beginning with handmade bowls,
platters, pitchers and vases.
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Although she owned a potter's wheel, it was not a
centerpiece of her workshop. While most craft potters invested in
molds that allowed the production of dozens, hundreds or evens thousands of
identical items, Edith never
used a mold. Instead she approached clay with the eye of an
artist. She felt that each piece, naturally, should be made entirely by
hand. Starting with a big block of gray-brown moist clay, she used
sculptor's tools to carve and shape each ceramic piece. Although she had no
electrical technology training she mastered the skill of running "high
fire" electric kilns that would harden the clay at 2000 - 2300 degrees
Fahrenheit. The firing process took two and a half days, (and sometimes
dimmed the lights of the neighbors). |
Trained as a teacher, Edith decided to share her knowledge with the young children of rural Fairfiield County. And so was born the "Clay Club" of Turkey Plain Pottery. Beginning with a few neighbors and friends of her son Richard, she opened her studio to children age 5 to 10 years old.
Because there were no
comparable art classes for young children in the local schools, she especially
enjoyed opening their minds, and their hands to the creative medium.
Beginning with the basics - what is clay and how you can use it, she encouraged
her young students to use their imagination. Meeting once a month on
Saturday morning, they would work as a group to construct a frog, a dinosaur, a
pet cat, and sometimes even a cup or ashtray. Within a few years her
reputation spread and parents from Redding, Ridgefield, Danbury, Newtown and
other Fairfield County locales brought their children too.
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While the classes and flower vases helped pay the bills,
it was her one-of-a-kind sculpture that gave her true satisfaction and
attracted a steady flow of customers, mostly attracted by word of
mouth. In the late 1970's she experimented with stone sculpture, but
remained committed to ceramic work until her sudden death in April 1980 at age
69. |
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10/2/2010 All rights reserved (c) 2010 R. Cauchi - http://www.colorado2.com/cauchi/edith_cauchi.html