Ceramics balance control, spontaneity for artist

In art, as in life, there are things you can control and things you can’t.

Wisdom comes in knowing which is which. It is a lesson that master ceramicist Don Reitz has grasped thoroughly. And literally: By manipulating what variables he can in each firing, Reitz is able to walk the slippery line between technique and improvisation. The Elvehjem Museum of Art will illustrate this sense of balance in a major retrospective of his work, opening Saturday, March 12.

One of the variables Reitz has been able to experiment with is the salting glaze method he uses.

Derived sometime in the 12th century as a fast and economical way to glaze such things as sewer and roofing tile, gutters and storage containers, salt glaze pieces usually are dark brown in color and are characterized by a rippled, orange-peel surface. Reitz, an emeritus professor of art who taught here from 1962-1988, is credited with almost single-handedly reviving the technique.

He says it was a kind of evolution. “Each piece builds to the next. It’s like when you shoot pool. The next shot depends on the shot before it,” he says. “In my life there have been no rules, just concepts, and I’ve been able to translate my life into my art.”

The evolutionary aspect of Reitz’s work will be especially evident in the Elvehjem exhibition. It will include about 75 pieces created from the 1960s to the present.

For example, visitors will be able to chart the development of a utilitarian piece of pottery, a teapot, into a sculptural unit in the piece “Tea Spaces.”

“I don’t care for tea, but I like the teapot vessel,” he says. “I expanded it into the 5-foot-tall sculpture. I wanted to celebrate the shape.”

In addition to applying his one-thing-leads-to-the-next philosophy to his artistic life, Reitz has followed it in his classroom.

“I give students a problem — rather than tell them to create a cup, I tell them to make a vessel which can carry liquid to the mouth. That wording pushes the horizons back, I think. It expands the mind and encourages creativity.

The exhibit will begin with a slide show/lecture by Reitz at 5 p.m. on Friday, March 11, in L160 Elvehjem. The presentation is free to Elvehjem members and children 12 and under, $5 for nonmembers. A preview of the exhibition and a reception will follow.

Elvehjem guest curator Judy Clowes, author of “Don Reitz: Clay, Fire, Salt and Wood” (University of Wisconsin Press distributor, 2004); former Reitz students and others will discuss his work at free public panels at 9:30 a.m. on Saturday, March 12, in L140 Elvehjem. Clowes also will lecture about the exhibition at 7 p.m. on Thursday, March 17, in the Elvehjem’s Gallery VII. Fellow ceramicists from around the country will consider the impact of Reitz’s work at 4 p.m. on Thursday, April 7, in L160 Elvehjem. Nobel laureate, poet and playwright Roald Hoffman, Frank H.T. Rhodes Professor of Humane Letters and Chemistry at Cornell University, will present an illustrated lecture, “Chemistry and Ceramics” at 5:30 p.m. on Monday, April 25, in L140 Elvehjem.

“Don Reitz: Clay, Fire, Salt and Wood” will be on display through Sunday, June 5. For information about the exhibition or programs, contact the Elvehjem, 263-2246 or visit http://www.lvm.wisc.edu.