Meet the Maker: A Conversation with Adam Field

From Darkroom to Clay

What was your introduction to pottery as a craft?

AF: When I was finishing fifth grade, my school district offered a week-long YMCA-type art camp in the mountains. It was the first time I went from a couple of 40-minute art classes a week to choosing two subjects. I took darkroom photography and small metal jewelry. The darkroom photography especially grabbed hold of me, and I continued it through middle school and high school. And that was really my focus going into college.

Then, one of the key things that happened in the mid to late ’90s was digital photography replacing a lot of the darkroom analog work. I found myself in front of a computer watching the rainbow beach ball spin while trying to change contrast or brightness. So by the time I was a junior in college, I had priority for enrollment, so I decided to take a pottery class. It seemed like it was going to be fun, more hands-on and an easy grade. What I didn’t realize was that the teacher gave us assignments that were no joke. They were real challenges.

What I found was something really fulfilling that had been missing in the transition to digital. In the darkroom, you’d think, “I want to change the contrast,” make an adjustment, and immediately see the result. With clay it was the same: pull a cylinder, want to make a bowl, do the thing with your hands, and the result was immediate.

First Production, First Lessons

Was it after that first class that pottery started to take over?

AF: Yeah. Through the interest in pottery I got from that class, I stopped in at a local gallery in downtown Durango, where I went to college. I got to chatting with a potter there, and he said, “I’m always looking for people to help with production—if that’s of interest, let me know.”

That was the first summer I didn’t go back to Denver. I stayed in Durango, knowing I could throw production for this potter and also keep a restaurant job. Interestingly, there are so many parallels between how kitchens are run and how I run my studio—keeping a clean workspace, prepping for a smooth workflow—those early experiences planted some of the first seeds of my connection between clay and food.

The potter I worked for had me making these little bowls, four inches round by two inches tall. I made about 600 of them that first year. When I came back to school, the difference was huge. One of our assignments was to take the amount of clay equal to your two fists and throw the tallest cylinder you could. My first year, those were like doorstops—heavy, poorly crafted. But after making 600 tiny bowls, I knew how to move clay efficiently. Suddenly it felt like a superpower.

This was one of the first times I experienced the direct benefit of putting in the work. That really set me on a course of valuing hands-on, learning-by-doing over academic learning. A lot of my friends went on to MFAs. For me, it was about those experiences of learning through doing.

“After making 600 tiny bowls, I knew how to move clay efficiently. Suddenly it felt like a superpower.”

Building a Practice by Saying Yes

Since then, what were the key learning moments?

AF: After college, I moved to the San Francisco Bay Area, thinking, “Well, I threw for a potter in Durango, so I can approach the best potters in San Francisco.” Of course, they were like, “Who are you?” That was humbling.

But one of them suggested I apply to a job at the ceramic supply store and that job turned out to be an amazing education. I had to answer customers’ questions, which filled gaps in my limited ceramics education. My boss gave us budgets for workshops and classes, and the Bay Area had an incredible ceramic community. I figured out what really struck a chord with me.

Working there also led me into the woodfire community. Potters would come in to prep for firings and ask if I’d ever wood-fired or would be interested. I made a deal with myself: the answer would always be yes. That gave me a glimpse into woodfiring in the Bay Area.

That’s how I met Richard Carter. He had this amazing orchard property near St. Helena with studios for residents. I worked part-time at the supply store and spent all my other time there, helping build kilns and woodfire. Initially, I came in a little too big for my britches, thinking I was a great potter, but Richard was never impressed. Instead of critiquing me directly, he pointed me to his collection of antique Korean, Japanese, and Chinese pottery books. He’d ask, “Do you know about this tradition? That tradition?” It was his indirect way of saying, “Look at other work.”

Richard had also been the gardener at the French Laundry, so he had strong ideas about food and how it related to well-crafted functional pots. His garden and meals with residents connected food and pots in a very real way. That was formative. Later, when I had assistants, I realized how important that context was.

Finding a Personal Style

How did those experiences influence the style we see now?

AF: As for cultivating my own style, in art school there’s a lot of pressure to make something uniquely yours. Ironically, once you do, you’re told to keep changing. My answer has been to hold on to what I find important and enjoyable in my work, but also to keep learning. If I can decrease the resistance between the idea and the execution of an object—through repetition, muscle memory, and learning—then the work becomes more direct.

That’s why I still take workshops. Friends raise eyebrows because I teach workshops, but I also attend them. I want to stay a lifelong student. That was a big part of the onggi apprenticeship too.

Fast-forwarding, I moved to Maui with my first wife, Heesoo Lee, whom I met in the Bay Area. We started our family there. Eventually we were selling at the Four Seasons Resort in Wailea, which was one of the better venues in Maui. That was a three-year stretch where, for the first time, we could really get what we thought our work was worth. Of course, that’s a double-edged sword—you have to keep making and keep selling. But it also pushed me to keep learning and changing my work.

I think that’s where I really developed the style that you see in my work now, looking at a lot of patterns in traditional Hawaiian, South Pacific fabrics and basketry, and incorporating that into my carvings.

“If I can decrease the resistance between the idea and the execution of an object—through repetition, muscle memory, and learning—then the work becomes more direct.”

The Onggi Apprenticeship

So how did the onggi apprenticeship with Ohbuja come into your life?

AF: The big thing that made the shift for us wanting to move to Korea is that my father passed away unexpectedly. And we felt the really difficult thing of being so far from family, and of thinking that life would always carry on outside of Paradise. That’s what prompted us to move to Korea.

Another part of it was that my son had a year, age wise, before he would start school in the U.S. So we thought this could actually be pretty key timing, with him already having English pretty solid and some Korean through his mother. We got the one-time, one-year visa as a family member to a Korean citizen. And on a scouting trip my mother-in-law said, “Some friends took me to this onggi studio; I think Adam would enjoy a tour,” and that was the introduction.

I truly couldn’t have researched and found a better studio. It was a huge stroke of luck I didn’t realize until years after, when people asked how to find a place to study. It wasn’t just finding the right place; it was the family connection—the Kim family there at Ohbuja aren’t inclined to take just anybody on as an apprentice.

What was the daily rhythm of apprenticing at Ohbuja?

AF: It was the most physically challenging experience of my life, and super focused. The Kim family took me in like one of their own, and the rhythm was all about efficiency that’s been figured out over, you know, thousands of years: clay, water, wood—no wasted motion. My first day we were already firing a kiln, and even the way they picked up and fed wood was really efficient, so you weren’t wrecked by the end of the 5-day wood firing.

I started out making 20-liter onggi as an entry point pot during my apprenticeship. After watching my teachers at their wheels and taking notes on the steps of the process for the first week I started practicing making onggi. After making each onggi to the best of my ability I would cut the jar in half to get a look at the wall cross section allowing me to see where the walls had been made too thick or thin.

As I gained skills I had my first acceptable onggi after about 6 weeks of practice and my teachers allowed me to graduate up to attempting the next size up in their production; a 30-liter onggi. With each step up in size there were new challenges but I also noticed that the time it took me to get to a successful jar in a new size was decreasing with each new scale shift.

By the end of my apprenticeship I had made about 500 onggi jars and had worked my way up to making the largest of the onggi in their standard production; 150-liter. Of the 500 jars made all but two of the onggi had been cut in half to analyze the wall thickness.

Firing had its own cadence. Over 6–8 weeks, we built up enough work to load the kiln. Once the pots were glazed within the traditional style—though the exact mix of marks happened in the moment—we fired the wood kiln for five days straight. It was the hardest work I’ve done, and the most clarifying.

“It was the most physically challenging experience of my life, and super focused… clay, water, wood—no wasted motion.”

Returning Home, Finding Place

After coming back to the U.S., how did onggi fit into your practice?

AF: At first I was pretty hesitant and unsure where I fit in terms of not being Korean and making these traditional pots. Then, I slowly dipped my toes into it and made some here and there for people that were really wanting to have a traditionally crafted onggi jar in the States.

But one of the key moments was when Dave Chang and his restaurant group reached out to me. First off, I was a big fan. I was teaching a workshop in Brooklyn, and they’re like, “Hey, we see you’re going to be here next week. Is there any way you could make some time to come and meet with us at our headquarters?” And I was ecstatic.

Of course, there was that funny part of him, when his team first brought me to his attention, of like, “Are you fucking kidding me? This is a white guy in Montana. Try again.” And they’re like, “No, no, check him out. He did the real deal.”

So to have somebody who is such a representative of Korean American culture tapping my shoulder and being like, we like what you’re doing and it seems to be fairly authentic. You learned from some great people, let’s work together. I think that was a turning point for me. And it kind of pushed me to put some pretty strong boundaries on the way that I was representing myself and the work.

What Stays Traditional and What Evolves

In your onggi practice, what remains strict and what adapts?

AF: For me, it is really important that I keep it as traditional as I possibly can and try to keep the forms pretty specific to what I learned. I don’t sign them, which I’ve gotten some grief from some customers, like they want some certain degree of collectibility. And for me, when it goes from “I am carrying on this tradition” to “look at these amazing pots I’m making,” it starts to feel kind of gross.

I think of myself as a conduit of this amazing tradition. I think it’s important that my teachers very generously passed it along and said, go forth and share this with an audience that we would otherwise not reach in terms of handmade, traditional onggi.

Do you still use traditional onggi tools?

AF: I do use the traditional tools but the actual tools I brought back from my apprenticeship in Korea have been retired. I regret that I wasn’t there at a time when my teachers were making a new batch of tools, which happened on about a three year cycle. If I could do any other learning experience at this point, it would be like go back there and do a deep dive on tool making.

At one of my early onggi workshops in Denver, I arrived the night before after an eight-hour drive, and realized my onggi tools were sitting in a bucket of water back in my studio. After going through all of the possible ways to fix it, I was like, “ok, I think the best thing to do is to invest in some power tools and make my own.” And that was the first step into making my own tools. Since then, I’ve been making new tools in the traditional style as needed.

There is also a practical side. My teachers used those red, blue and yellow plastic push pins to hold the leather onto my paddle tools because they worked and were available. That’s part of a living tradition. You keep awareness and respect while continuing the practice.

Order, Flow, and Getting Started

Can you describe the flow of your process and any rituals that help you begin?

AF: I keep a really tidy studio. Definitely, that’s the commentary when people are in my workspace, whether it’s other potters or people who just have a basic understanding of workspace. And that’s pretty important to me. Not having a lot of visual clutter to be able to get into a space of getting into work.

I also really hold tightly to this idea of, “ just do anything to get started.” Because I’m a bit of an over-thinker, and so if I were left to just thinking about what I’m going to do, then I would never get anything done. So I try to find any little task to just get going, and somehow that creates momentum for more.

And it’s nice because I do have that choice of, “Okay, do I feel like getting really intricate with the porcelain work, or do I feel like filling a prescription,” which is what the onggi really is.

Fermentation at Home

Have you fermented in your own onggi?

AF: It’s actually a part of the story of how my now wife, Jesse, and I met. Jesse runs a massage practice and a community-supported apothecary (CSA model). She grows a lot of the botanicals and herbs that go into the different things that she makes for her distributions. And we connected through a mutual friend and did a trade of massage for fermentation vessels, and she does a lot of fermentation in those jars.

For me, it’s a bit like the cobblers’ children and shoes. I’m so busy making all these fermentation jars that there’s not much time to put into doing the ferments. That said, I made a really good batch of sauerkraut in one of our onggi jars this spring. We’ve also done fermented salsas and hot sauce at home. We have a seven-gallon we use for fire cider—right in the middle of the kitchen on the island.

Living Traditions

What do you hope people feel or understand through your work?

AF: I’m a big fan of studying past cultures and people. I’m not a religious person, was not raised as one, and I think in some ways, the connection with people who’ve lived this experience on Earth in the past is my closest thing to that.

One thing that we all have in common is the time that we spend alive here—and to have a very specific point in time recording of one person that gets locked into a material that can last 1000s of years, is pretty amazing. Somebody can hit metal with a hammer, or they can form glass, but none of those will record as directly as clay can. And on top of that, it is a really basic and accessible material.

I think a lot of times, process can eliminate access. And clay is really special, because you just need to be able to make a fire and understand a little bit about this squishy stuff under our feet, and anybody can do it. My hope is that people can feel some kind of historical connection in the work, and understand that an individual or a specific tradition can play a role in our lives.

A lot of the objects that are in our lives are not the result of an individual, right? As I sit here, I’m thinking: my truck, my kids bike, my glasses, all of these things don’t really have the mark of an individual on them. And as somebody who surrounds myself with handmade pots, I can think of a person and my experience with them every time I choose a different piece from my kitchen cabinet.

“One thing that we all have in common is the time that we spend alive here - and to have a very specific point in time recording of one person that gets locked into a material that can last 1000s of years, is pretty amazing.”

How do you define a “living tradition,” and what do you want to pass on?

AF: It surprised me how much change was part of what I experienced from the Kim family in their practice. Since I returned to the States from my apprenticeship, I’ve often gotten comments about the authenticity of my tools. For instance, I used those red, blue and yellow plastic push pins to hold the leather onto my paddle tool, and some felt that it created a disconnect and lack of authenticity with the tradition.

Now, the fact of the matter is, those were the push pins my teachers put in there during my apprenticeship, because a big part of their tradition is “get it done.” We’ve got a lot of work to do, and we’re not going to spend hours looking for just the right historical-looking push pin when we can go down to the corner store and get ones that are cheap and work.

So that was the context for me about “living tradition.” I think that really defines their struggle—where do you draw the lines? They do have pug mills that extrude coils to just the right size. As an apprentice, I never got to use those coils, because that’s how all of them learned. You learn the right way first and then you can get help when it comes time to actually pay the bills.

But a certain percentage of what they make, in order to receive those designations of intangible cultural treasure needs to be done in a traditional way. There are people who come and check to make sure a certain percentage of their production is done without help from these modern methods. They want it to be a living tradition—like a living museum. So those are things I think about—how can you keep some of this ancient knowledge alive and keep it from totally disappearing? I think the answer is having the awareness, but also continuing the practice.

Anything else you want people to know about onggi?

AF: One thing that comes to mind that I always want to make sure gets talked about is factory made onggi. Because of the mold-making and compression process, it generally doesn't have the same breathability you get with handmade onggi. That’s one of the big questions I get—“what’s different between your onggi and what I could go down to H-Mart and buy?”

Just for context—you can make wine in a two liter plastic Coke bottle, or you can make it in a French oak barrel, and it’s going to make a difference in the finished product. That’s how I frame it for people to understand the difference in what I’m doing.