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got smaller and smaller, until it became one air hole. That's the closed form. That's how it started.

But then, it's like a canvas to me, a three-dimensional canvas that I would brush and paint.

D: When I think of your brushstroke, that's how I connect it to the aesthetic of spontaneity that I'm talking about. Because it seems a very spontaneous treatment of the brushstroke.

T: Well, it is. But how did it get to be that spontaneous?

D: I'm asking you.

T: Well, the thing is, it started off -- people would like to know, I mean students, I see some who take exactly -- I'm at this point now, and they try to take that, but they don't know what preceded this, to get to this point.

So sometimes I say, It's like a flower. You see a flower in bloom, it's my work, it's want I have been doing right now. If you see that, you take that, you make that, how can you do to make your own, to plant that idea, and gradually go and develop on our own.
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How it started was, for instance you have a plate like this, I used to divide it in half, fourths, eighths, then I would make a sketch in pencil, and then the brush. And gradually it got looser and looser and looser. And then it became more spontaneous. It was a process that took years.

D: So you were working towards looseness.

T: Yeah, but in the beginning. you can't help because you're not too sure so you have to measure things. But gradually don't measure but go looser, gradually the brush starts swinging.

D: But I'm interested in why would you value that spontaneity, why would that be something that you work towards? Is that connected to your feelings about the pottery, or is related to Zen in any way?

T: I have no connection with Zen. I don't think in terms of Zen.

D: Okay, we'll leave that behind then.

T: If you start thinking of Zen, then I think you stifle yourself, that "I'm going to do this because it is Zen," I don't want to think that way. I just want to flow. And I like the idea of being able to be -- I like the freedom that the brush would go. Like the way I wanted to learn how to ride a horse, because there's a freedom in riding. And I wanted to do other things of this type of freedom. You need that kind of freedom, of a certain type. Your whole body gets to be part of everything, and you become free.