ABOUT LYNETTE
I am a Psychotherapist by profession and a Potter – with a mission.
Since graduating as a Social Worker, I have worn many hats. From being clinician to supervisor, consumer market researcher to trainer, Administrative Executive Secretary to Executive Director and now business owner. I served with Government ministries, Churches, Non-Government Organisations, and also in education, medical and legal settings.
My longest service is at home as a mother and grandmother.
Engaging in arts as a hobby has helped me find balance in my multi-dimensional work and home life.
This pottery studio is the epitome of my investment in a hobby!
My journey with Arts and Clay
I took up painting as a hobby back in 2007. Home duties lightened up and the artist child within enjoyed newfound freedom to explore.
The journey became a self-curated arts curriculum in which I explored various painting mediums. I experimented with, and love fused glass, tried my hand at working with resin and took up a course on sculpting. However, in 2015, a Paulus Berensohn documentary opened up a “clay portal” and I fell deep down into the “rabbit hole”. It was a path that led me to setting up a pottery studio. 3 years of shadowing a partner and other potters followed. Covid put a scare but rising out of the darkness, in Aug 2022, I took the leap to fly solo. TheraClay Studio was formed and dreams of integrating pottery work with my counseling practice began to take shape. Come 2023, The Holding Space will be re-located to share the same premise as the studio. Read my blog “Change is coming” for more.
Playing with clay is seriously fun.
When I was in my 30s, I wanted to take up pottery. The veteran potter with his hands caked with mud, said to me, “if you wish to learn the craft, you need patience”.
As a full time mom to 2 pre-school kids, time and patience were not my resources. Dirt filled fingernails also would not do.
Today, I’m making up for lost opportunity and am having so much fun allowing the artist in me explore and play with clay! My studio is my safe place to be messy and to create. But it is clean too… the fastidious housewife lurks.
Patience and time are still key qualities needed. The stages of creating, waiting and testing (repeatedly) have not changed.
Time however stands still at the studio. For the harried, time slows down when you touch clay and you soon forget the cares of the world. Clay has that therapeutic quality.
One is never too old to learn. Pottery admittedly, is a hobby that costs – time and money. If you are in a hurry, this may not be for you. If you seek fame and fortune, you need to give yourself a long runway.
Take it up – because it is fun and keeps the brain actively stimulated.
Take it up – because creating feeds the soul.
Take it up – to enjoy making lovely things or better yet, to bless others with hand made gifts!