Ehren Tool Art for Sale at Auction

“ I decorate cups with images of war and violence. The use of these icons reveals how abstract war is for most of our culture— so abstract in fact, that somehow it’s okay to use images of war as toys.”

We visited Ehren at his Berkeley home, in the basement studio space that he shares with his wife and mother-in-law, who are also potters. Before letting us run loose in his workspace he took us on a tour of the dense and extravagant garden that his mother-in-law has cultivated, where I saw plump kiwi fruit hanging off of vines and koi fish in the pond, prompting me to let out child-like yelps of delight. After the garden tour we went up to the house, and Ehren let us snoop around his equally densely and extravagantly decorated home while he made coffee. With our caffeine fixes taken care of, we headed down to Ehren’s studio. Despite how packed the space is, Ehren moves around with ease and seems to know where everything is at any given moment. He has no trouble multi-tasking, and while he threw clay on his potter’s wheel we chatted about politics, war, family and the cups he makes. Talking about war with someone who has been to war is a strange thing. I felt more cautious asking questions. I was hyper aware of the fact that to someone like me, war-time realities are at best, foggy second-hand sound bites that are too often attached to polarized points of view. It also seemed hard for Ehren to talk about his personal experiences and general philosophies concerning war. It was difficult for him to find the right words, and articulate them, and he often cut off his own sentences or let them trail off into silence. But when we talked about war within the context of his art practice and the cups he makes, the conversation got a lot easier for both of us. No doubt about it, the cups are catalysts— enabling Ehren to construct and work out war-related narratives, and then invite other’s into the conversation. The conversation is often difficult territory, but the cups offer a starting point that feels more accessible and comfortable to most people. It’s a funny twist in timing that I just finished re-reading Tim O’Brien’s, The Things They Carried, a work of fiction about the American war in Vietnam. At one point in the book, O’Brien states, By telling stories, you objectify your own experience…You pin down certain truths. You make up others…you carry it forward to clarify and explain. This is what I think Ehren is doing with his cups— he is essentially telling ‘war stories’ that make the abstract more real, and he’s pushing these stories forward, keeping them alive, and with honesty and guts, he’s asking all of us to talk about what is at the heart of his work: What is the nature of war, and how does it effect us?