Eco-Porcelain

"Let ours be a time remembered for the awakening of a new reverence for life, the firm resolve to achieve sustainability, the quickening of the struggle for justice and peace, and the joyful celebration of life."
The Earth Charter

The green issue. I just made a list of why I can claim my porcelain is green. It will be included in all of my promotional materials from now on. Sustainably handmade has been stamped on my pots for years and the verbiage included with each piece touches upon sustainability, handmade, community and all of the things I hold dear. But, a new intensity around what is green is emerging and I have decided to take a stand, thus writing a stronger statement.

One Black Bird had guest blogger Laura Zindel weigh in recently on what constitutes green ceramics and her post really got me going. I am just glad the conversation has truly begun. There are many points in her post I could address and would like to discuss with others interested in eco-production, ceramic or otherwise. It is a huge realm which we are only beginning to address. Pundits and neophytes alike need to think, act and speak according to available knowledge, which boils down to what you know. Colin Beavan recently wrote an entry on his No Impact Man blog called On not letting eco-dogma start the next war. I call it environmental fundamentalism and it just doesn't serve. Intensity is necessary, but there are myriad problems and solutions needing to be worked on and some of them may take years, decades even to resolve and shift. People need to be engaged, not preached to and alienated.

One thing those of us who are really thinking about this stuff can do, is make a claim! Then defend it. As we defend, we learn, we refine, we interact, and we expand our current knowledge base. It is my firm belief that we really don't know what we're doing. But, we are doing it and however imperfectly that is manifesting, we are doing it together. The most essential thing I have taken away from these years of working on environmental sustainability and community development, economic, social and spiritual is that we are all connected. That is what we need to focus on and develop. Perfection is well, just boring, IMHO.

Peace, love and welcome to the new reality...

technorati tags: ecoporcelain, davistudio, green, oneblackbird, noimpactman