COBB >> In 1978, Gregg Lindsley spent the year hand-throwing thousands of ceramic pots under the guidance of master potter Dean Strawn. “He had me do a Japanese style apprenticeship,” explained Lindsley. “I had to throw 2,000 pots all the same before I could do anything else. It took me a year and 20,000 tries but I did it.”
Lindsley uprooted his life in Maryland to study under Strawn, who was living in Lower Lake. “I moved out here to work with him specifically,” he said. “I drove all the way across the country in my car.”
He spent years perfecting his craft with Strawn, who he’d heard about through the friend of a friend, until he felt confident enough to go out on his own. “I stayed with him about seven years and I’ve been throwing pots ever since,” Lindsley said.
Before pottery, Lindsley dabbled in a variety of other artistic pursuits including canvas oil painting, Scandinavian-style furniture making and writing poetry, prose and newspaper articles. But nothing stuck like wet clay on the wheel. “I’ve always been an artist and I was looking for my medium and I found pottery one day by going to a place called the Torpedo Factory in Virginia,” he said. “I love to throw pots. There’s a lot of aspects of pottery, physics and chemistry, but I like the actual feel and art of throwing.”
The medium attracted Lindsley because of the state of mind required to work. “Making objects out of clay on the wheel is what I like the best. It’s a form of meditation,” he said. “It requires patience and a Zen-like attitude. You have to be present at all times, otherwise it doesn’t work.”
Lindsley’s pottery is art that should be touched and handled, not work that hangs on the wall or sits on a shelf to be admired from a distance. “I’m not an artist potter, I’m a functional potter,” he said. “My motto is function and beauty I make what I make and I make it over and over again. I’m kinda an anachronism in American ceramics. I love 20 bowls that all look the same sitting on a shelf.”
So it’s no surprise that he doesn’t look to the scenic mountains or the calm lake to inspire his pieces. “I think that’s art speak. That’s meaningless, frankly,” Lindsley said, explaining that the functionality of his work is of high importance. It matters most when someone informs him that they constantly utilize his pieces. “’I use these coffee mugs every morning.’ That makes my day. That’s what makes this all worthwhile.”
Part of pottery’s appeal is that the art form is benign. “I decided to be a potter because it doesn’t harm anybody,” he said, adding that his customers also receive beautiful items once a work is completed. “That’s my reward. And I’m able to make my own living doing what I love.”
Bowls, plates, mugs, platters, these are a few of the many items Lindsley throws for his customers. He also takes custom orders and creates pots for other potters. “I can make anything, I’ve been doing this so long,” he said. At the moment he’s working on sauerkraut fermentation crocks and 2 and a half gallon Kombucha tea crocks. Even more unusual are the sinks that he’s in the process of learning how to build.
Lindsley’s items are uniform, constructed the same way repeatedly. Of course, this is only an asset to his business. “I have a product line and that’s what people expect,” he said. “You can’t spend 100 hours on a piece because you can’t get your money. Nobody is going to pay $1,000 for a jug with a bunny head on it.”
Some of Lindsley’s work can be seen at Lake Works on Main Street in Lakeport. He has wholesale agreements with stores up and down Northern California, from Monterey to Willits, takes online orders, organizes six to eight shows a years and sells mugs at beer festivals. “I make beer mugs, 24 ounce, 30 ounce, big ones. I go to festivals and take only beer mugs,” Lindsley said. People pay $40 for admission and a 7 ounce glass that they attempt to fill constantly throughout the course of the day. “It’s a very lucrative day and I get to drink beer too.” It’s the perfect event for Lindsley.
“It’s a lot of different things that make a business go and that’s true here,” he added.
Aside from creating his own pottery, Lindsley has been instructing students in Lake County since leaving a teaching position in Ukiah. He currently has two full classes. “I started teaching in the 2000s at Mendocino College, and I just really, really like it,” he said. “It’s nice to see [students] progress and they’re so excited. And I just love teaching, it’s so much fun and they say I’m good at it It’s taken years to build up the nomenclature, the way to describe how to do it.”
Lindsley uses his own beginnings as a source of encouragement for his students. “I still have the first pot,” he said, describing the piece as terrible, as is common during the beginning of any craft. “That’s an example to my students When they get discouraged I pull that out.”
These days Lindsley is exactly the opposite of terrible, throwing pot after pot with precision. “I can make a mug in 3 minutes. I’m a three minute thrower,” he said. Though he did admit that this time frame is a little deceptive, considering that once the pot is off the wheel he still has to trim, glaze and fire it. Still, there’s no denying that he’s quick. “Not very long is probably a good answer,” he said, when asked how much time it takes to make a piece.
Though Lindsley very occasionally takes some personal time, a day off in the life of a potter is rare. “I throw every day and there’s always something to do in pottery,” he said.
Jennifer Gruenke can be reached at 900-2019.
