Devyani Smith

Ceramics / Installation

After successfully maintaining a ceramic studio in Mumbai for the last 10 years, Devyani Smith has reached an intersection of life that makes her reflective about “the known and the unknown, the done and the undone, the life lived and the life to be lived”. Thus, her SAAS-3 proposal: BROKEN POTTERY or LIFE BETWEEN LIVES is the deeply personal attempt to create “a place in the head where you put yourself before deciding where your next attachment is… a life between lives”. The idea that she sets up “another studio” in Gunehar “all over again” does not appeal to her; she would much rather carry with her the broken pieces of pottery laying around in her studio and combine these with other materials to create a map of consciousness and contemplation, consisting of lines not “merely to see but to live through”.

Day 10

I am here in the now !

I have my broken pieces of pottery and I have a house that is my work space , here I have four generations from the same family , baba , baba’s daughter in law , July Devi….. no she was not born in July and even she has no idea why her name is July Devi!! And July Devi’s daughter in law Santoshi and Santoshi’s 4 year daughter Urvi . All these members of the family who now live in the pakka ghar are the regular visitors of the old house where I work and all have become part of the work that is slowly evolving .

I’m looking at ‘life between lives’ or ‘lives within a life’ in this work.

The core has been made and broken and made again differently multiple times in last 7-8 days of working which in itself is reflection of the life lived.

 

 

I have been a studio potter for almost a decade, running a studio in Mumbai since 2014. Feeling settled with struggles and loving what I do, has brought me to a point of thoughtful contemplation. So here I am not making pottery but using it as a material, merging and blending  it with other mediums. This is my attempt to bring some parts from my past and present together to see what future will look like .