Since I last wrote a blog my website has been moved to another server and my original web designer has resumed his job as helper to this low-tech blogger. You may notice that the blog page is now a properly integrated part of the website. I am told that assembling my notes and photos will be easier and I hope quicker. In the next little while I plan to make some more changes. I’ll add more images to the portfolio area and update the galleries page. You will notice that it is much easier to register for an email notification of each new blog.
Meanwhile I have lots of photos of clay-related and other art events waiting to be selected for posting here.
Two TriCity Potters members gave us presentations at our May meeting in the ‘getting to know each other’ series that we started when the club was new. We like to hear about the path each person has taken to his or her current involvement in clay and see samples of the work.
Laura Giesbrecht spoke first with a short ‘slide’ show and then showed us some of her pieces. Two were plates she is donating to the Port Moody Arts Centre Fund-raising Dinner. She has an SFU degree in Archaeology and Geography, worked for twenty years in Municipal Planning, left that four years ago, took an intensive three years of pottery classes at Shadbolt Centre for the Arts, and now works out of her Port Coquitlam home as a potter. She offers a combination of functional wheel-thrown work with some more fantastical pieces.
Her website is: http://www.sisterearthclayworks.com 
I have one photo of Laura with the pieces she brought to show us and I’ve taken an image from her website. It is a close-up shot of one of her whimsical masks. I’m looking forward to seeing what she brings to ‘Art in the Garden’ in July. (more about that below)
Eliza Wang was the other presenter this evening. The next blog will feature her work.
We’re looking forward to seeing Brigitta Schneiter’s presentation one evening in the future. I hope she’s completely recovered from a nasty throat infection which prevented her from coming to our May meeting.
Two other items to mention.. 
The ‘Hands: That Shape Our Community’ show at Port Moody’s Gallery Bistro has been extended until the end of June. The photo of me and my photographer Tracey Riddell holding the jugbird I was starting to make in the large photo behind us was taken at the show’s celebration event in May. If you pop in to Gallery Bistro to visit the show keep in mind that it is also a great place to have a fine home-cooked lunch!
Coming up in July is ‘Art in the Garden’, a biennial garden tour which features not only beautiful gardens but also the work of one or more artists in each garden. This year’s tour will take place in the Tri-Cities with a free Art and Garden Fair at Port Moody Arts Centre. Those who wish to visit the ten private gardens will pay $20, or $15 if in a group of 8 or more people. 
I can’t remember what possessed me to volunteer our garden for this fund-raising event. Heaven knows I can’t do all the expected weeding in time! But it occurred to me that we potters make lots of pieces that are not functional and are often intended for display outside. The houses made by those who took Susan Delatour Lepoidevin’s workshop would look quite delightful in a grassy setting so their creators are invited to lend them for the day. So now it has been decided that the artists in my garden will be TriCity Potters members. I have asked that the work shown be garden-related, whether it is a bird-bath or feeder, a decorative fence-topper, plant pot, vase, or purely ornamental flowers, birds or bees (yes, there will be a vast ceramic bee!). All the art displayed will be made of clay.
With all the amusing and amazing work to be seen in my garden perhaps the visitors will forgive the fact that the current array of gorgeous flowers will have done their thing by then. We should have lots of fuchsias and hollyhocks instead.
