Perfect Imperfection
Ceramicist Mark Churchill in his studio.
Written by Lorie Dewhirst Porter | Photography by Marian Schulze
Ojai native MARK CHURCHILL has been making pottery for more than 30 years. For much of that time, he worked as an apprentice to local master Frank Massarella; Churchill’s apprentice is Kiran Sahgal. Collectively they belong to Ojai’s ceramics lineage, which famously stretches back to renowned clay masters Vivika and Otto Heino and, of course, Beatrice “Beato” Wood.
Churchill’s own style is evident in his creations, which fuse his unique talents with Japanese and Korean aesthetics and techniques. Over the past decade he has been perfecting his version of the moon jar, a large, round porcelain vessel whose origins date to Korea’s Joseon Dynasty (1392–1897). Revered historically as the embodiment of Confucian ideals, moon jars remain highly prized and collected worldwide. An 18th-century example recently fetched $4.5 million at Christie’s in New York.
“The thing about the moon jar is it’s completely perfectly imperfect,” Churchill says. “It has very formal elements; the opening at the top has to be wider than the outside diameter of the base.” It may sound simple, but moon jars are constructed by joining two large bowls together, which is no easy task. Porcelain clay is extremely tricky to work with, and disasters—like cracks—can occur at any stage in the process (drying, firing, cooling). “When I started making them, if I got one out of 10 not to crack, I’d be really lucky,” he admits, adding, “they’re supposed to be difficult. To me, the point of them is that they take everything you’ve got.”
There’s more to them, though, than their rigorous technical aspects. As a master potter once told Churchill, “When you hold your own moon jar it should feel like your mother’s embrace.”
