‘The most satisfying thing a human being can do – and the sexiest – is to make something. Life is about relationship – to each other – and to the material world. Making something is a relationship. The verb is the clue. We make love, we make babies, we make dinner, we make sense, we make a difference, we make it up, we make it new….True, we sometimes make a mess, but creativity never was a factory finish. The wrestle with material isn’t about subduing; it is about making a third thing that didn’t exist before. The raw material was there, and you were there, but the relationship that happens between maker and material allows the finished piece to be what it is. And that allows a further relationship to develop between the piece and the viewer or the buyer. Both relationships are in every way different from mass production or store bought objects that, however useful, are dead on arrival.
I have a set of silverware made by an eighteenth century silverworker called Hester Bateman, one of the very few women working in flatware at that time. When I eat with her spoons, I feel the work and the satisfaction that went into making them – the handle and bowl are in equal balance – and I feel a part of time as it really is – not chopped into little bits, but continuous. She made this beautiful thing, it’s still here, and I am here too, writing my books, eating my soup, two women making things across time. I feel connection, respect, delight. And it is just a spoon…
So I am in relationship to the object and in relationship to the maker. This allows me to escape from the anonymity and clutter of the way we live now. Instead of surrounding myself with lots of things I hardly notice, I have a few things that also seem to notice me. No doubt this is a fantasy – but…’ – Jeanette Winterson