We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Jaimie Nagle a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Jaimie, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Earning a full time living from one’s creative career can be incredibly difficult. Have you been able to do so and if so, can you share some of the key parts of your journey and any important advice or lessons that might help creatives who haven’t been able to yet?
It’s difficult to fathom that I have been a full-time artist for almost three years now. I’m able to earn a modest living from selling my work, but I also have a partner who is the main financial provider for our family. This partnership– while financially important–is also deeply rooted in respect and love. This is really the reason why I can do what I do.
In my former life (because that’s how it really feels!), I was an adjunct professor of English Literature and Creative Writing. While I was getting my PhD, I decided to take a ceramics class to relieve the stress of dissertation writing and exams. At 28 years-old, it was the first time I touched clay and I instantly fell in love. I found myself daydreaming about what it would be like to sit at a pottery wheel every day (cue the Demi Moore/Patrick Swayze scene from Ghost). I finished my PhD and built myself a small home studio in the garage as I practiced my craft. My love and obsession with the material only grew. I had a baby. I spent all my free time, which revolved around my daughter’s nap schedule, making, failing, learning, and making again.
I can’t say I made a conscious decision to “quit my day-job,” but I did know I wanted a change. It was about 5 years ago, after my second child was born, when I made a deal with myself to prioritize ceramic art over teaching at the university I drove to and from, an hour and half each way. It was only three months postpartum when I signed up for my first market. I tried not to put too much pressure on myself, thinking that if making pots remained just a hobby, I would still be happy. The market was a success–I truly felt like a super-human with a baby at my hip and almost all of my pottery sold. The experience gave me a little more confidence to keep going, and so I did.
My business, Icky Love Pottery, was born out of everything I felt in those early stages of motherhood, the duality of life. The “ickiness” and pure joy of child-rearing. The messiness of mud and its transformation into something beautiful. My journey as a business owner has been slow and steady. I’m not sure I would change the pace of my business growth, but I do wish I would have experimented with visual art more when I was younger. I wish I had a figure in my life growing up who said, “you can do this.” I’ll be 40 this summer, and I finally feel like I’ve figured out what I want to do when I grow up. I recently opened an art gallery, in just a few days, where I’m able to sell my work and other artists’ work that I love. I also have a small studio space and a place to teach workshops. It’s taken about 7 years from that initial pottery class to now, which may seem like a long stretch, but it really feels like a blip in my life.
As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?
I call myself a recovering academic, because like I mentioned before, I was a professor before transitioning to a full-time artist. One of the things I was worried about when making a huge career change was that I would miss teaching, so I’ve incorporated workshops into Icky Love Pottery’s business model. I loved teaching poetry (and still do, occasionally) because, to me, language means possibility. Clay is similar in that it lets us experience the world through a lens that is simultaneously specific and universal. For example, I may write a poem about my experience eating an orange for the first time, but it’s really about the intimacy of nature. When I make a plate, I’ll decorate it with flora inspired by the valley where I live in Hawai‘i, but it’s also a vessel that will hold food and nourish your body. What I make, and strive for others to make, is functional art. I believe there is beauty and emotion in our daily rituals and the things we use don’t have to be boring.
I think what Icky Love Pottery is known for, and what I’m most proud of, is that my work makes people happy. It’s a true gift to enter people’s homes and lives with my pots. I love making custom work for my clients–dinnerware, vases, drinking vessels–and using my surroundings as an inspiration. I’m never at a loss of ideas because I am blessed to be living in a place that feels alive with rain, the verdant ridges of the Ko‘olau Mountain Range, and the deep blues of the Pacific ocean.
My work is meant for everyday, and I always urge my customers to make good use of them. If you scroll through my Instagram feed you’ll find that my biggest sellers are mugs. How can I not smile with the thought that someone, somewhere around the world, is taking their first sips of their day from one of my cups? I don’t think it gets more intimate than that!
In your view, what can society to do to best support artists, creatives and a thriving creative ecosystem?
Because I was in the university system for so long, as a writer, I definitely have always felt the tension between those who create art and those who consume and critique it. Even now, if I’m selling my work at a craft fair, I will inevitably hear someone walk by and mutter, “I could make that.” or “$80 for a mug? That’s crazy!” I think of these moments as an opportunity to educate others on the skill and imagination involved in making handmade goods. In any discipline there are years of dedication to the craft, not to mention the cost of materials, time, and creative labor. Our society is fast–between technology and the American way of going going, going–that we rarely spend time looking, really looking, at what we consume. I think what we can do, collectively, is remind one another to slow down and be present, and drive the economy to do the same through intentional purchasing. As individuals that belong to a larger community of human beings, it is our responsibility to support sustainability, which means more farmers markets and less big box stores. I can’t compete with a store that sells mass-produced mugs for $5 each. The 6-8 hours I spend on a single cup doesn’t translate to the consumer who is programmed to desire the easy, fast, and inexpensive product. Ultimately, this outlook makes objects seem disposable. If I can buy a new set of mugs for $20, then why would I treat them well? The same goes for food, beauty products, and even entertainment. For me, giving my kids the gift of a morning hike is more meaningful than a new plastic toy. Handmade objects are like that: an experience, not a thing.
For you, what’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative?
The most rewarding aspect of being an artist is that I belong to a community that values creativity. And this is not to say that all of my artist friends and I have the same viewpoints on everything. In fact, what I love about the creative community is that it challenges you to do better. The pottery community, more specifically, is a generous one that is vast and mobile–I can learn almost anything from someone down the street or halfway across the world. I did not feel this way about the poetry community. In fact, the competitiveness and nepotism really wore me down in academia. Now I feel free and supported. And the best part is that now I can give back. By opening my gallery I am able to support artists based in Hawai‘i. I have curated a group of badass, female-identifying artists who are working in all different kinds of mediums. Giving artists a platform to do what they do is an amazing feeling.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.ickylove.com
- Instagram: @ickylovepottery and @ickylovegallery
- Facebook: @ickylovepottery