Potters Jon and Tessy Pettyjohn

For years, Jon Lorenzo Pettyjohn and Tessy San Juan Pettyjohn have been cleaning, crushing, screening and ageing clay from the ground. With quiet intensity, they have been whipping, slapping, slashing, pinching, and moulding clay on their potters’ wheel. They have been cutting slabs of clay with unusual tenderness.

They have been shaping their works with quiet madness that their hands have started to look like their own creations. Their glazes burst like heartbeats on hard clay. They have been patiently working with fire, the untouchable element which has perfected their well-crafted and quietly awesome pieces of stoneware pottery, the Philippines’ best for the past 30 years.

If there’s a ballad for warrior-artists who have kindled a love for and an understanding of pottery; whose unceasing revival of the ancient art that is closest to man’s skin as a passion for modern artists, it should be dedicated to Jon and Tessy, the undisputed mom and pop of contemporary Philippine pottery.

“We’re a great team. We’ve accomplished a lot by working together. I couldn’t have done it on my own,” says Jon, adding, “We’ve inspired a lot of people. That makes me feel good.”

Ironically, pottery was not their first love. Tessy almost missed it. “I was into painting with little of pottery when I was a student at the UP College of Fine Arts until the late 60s. Then I studied at the Philippine School of Interior Design, transferred to New York School of Interior Design, and proceeded to New York’s New School for Social Development. Back in Manila, I was into furniture-making with friend Moly Joaquin. I was into enamel jewelry and batik making with another friend, Lina Castrence (UP’s French professor). In 1972, my father built me a kick wheel and a 1 x 1 feet electric kiln. It was a beginning that never ended,” says Tessy.

Jon was a serious potter after college. “I took up Liberal Arts and pottery was my elective at Ohio’s Wilmington College. One summer, I went to New York’s New School for music. When I was in Barcelona, Spain, I studied at La Escuela Mason where I decided to be a potter. I learned that pottery began in China, but Japan became the mecca of modern-day potters. I was interested in undertaking apprenticeship in Japan. But I had to pass by Manila in 1976 where my mother Isabel stayed after divorcing my father in the US. (She was the sister of Zamboanga’s former matriarch, Maria Clara Lorenzo Lobregat). In time, I realized that the Philippines more than Japan was the best place for potters. I came and stayed forever.”

When their lives intersected, they embraced clay as their medium of art.

“I met Jon in 1978, during his first exhibit at Sining Kamalig (then at Taft Avenue). I had a furniture shop in Makati and I was also into pottery. I was interested in what he was doing. But during his exhibit, he didn’t say anything. I thought he was masungit,” recalls Tessy.

“We met again at the Design Centre (of Manila’s Cultural Center Complex). With other potters such as Al Delange, Kaye Delange, Baidy Mendoza, Nelfa Querubin, and Leonardo Villaroman, Jon and I formed the Potters Guild. Soon, famous expressionist painter Jaime de Guzman and his American wife Anne joined our group. There were very few of us, but we knew we were starting something that would eventually grow bigger someday,” recalls Tessy.

“While working together, Jon and I started dating at Paco Cemetery. We visited Hare Krishna and Mother Sachie, our favourite vegetarian restaurants. I was not yet a pure vegan then, but I was deep into transcendental meditation,” says she.

Recalling a whirlwind romance that was fired up by their love for pottery, Jon says, “She was a petite Filipina and a ceramist as well. I was a big Westerner. After our first date, we never parted again. We sensed that we could share a vision in life. After my first exhibition in Manila in 1978, in five months we were married. My mom understood although at first, she wanted me to meet rich society girls.”

The couple’s growing up pains included challenging problems in pottery-making in the Philippines.

“It was difficult at the start. There were no stores that sold clay. I went to the Bureau of Mines and the Bureau of Soil for assistance.  The National Science Development Board (NSDB, then NIST) told me about an abundant supply of clay in Bicol and Iloilo. That was how I started getting clay from the ground,” Jon says.

“I also realized that ready mixed glazes were not available. I took that as a challenge. Every time Tessy and I drove around, we stopped for sources of glazes along the way such as wood, cogon, sugar cane, and ashes. We always carried sacks where we kept these things. I experienced making everything myself. I realized it was better to do things that way,” he recalls.

Jon set up his first potter’s wheel at the old Celdran Ceramic School in Makati. His first workshop and kiln were at Manila’s Taft Avenue. He got an old house near the sea in Dalahican, Cavite where he built a 4 x 4 x 5 feet kiln. With the aid of two books, he  helped fellow potter Nelfa build a 3 x 3 feet wood-fired kiln in Iloilo, central Philippines.

“The ratio of success in my kilns is always 90 percent,” boasts Jon.

“It’s a mystery that the first sophisticated pottery was produced during the Sung Dynasty in the 11th and 12th century, when there was no machinery yet. Up to now, no one has surpassed the treasures of the Sung Dynasty,” Jon lectures, adding that his experience in the Philippines has taught him that hardship and sweat have perfected his sense of craftsmanship in pottery.

Like twin-artists, Jon and Tessy have mirrored each other in their studio in Calamba, Laguna, also their home since the early 80s.

“I’m into preparation of materials. I’m good at glazing. We influence each other,” says Tessy. “I do a lot of firing. We help each other a lot. We always work together,” attests Jon.

“It’s not easy working with someone so close to you, in terms of identifying what’s mine and what’s hers,” explains Jon, but he observes: “I have thick rims. Tessy’s works have delicate and thin rims.

She makes fine feet. I do stronger feet. She likes to make big and sculptural pieces. I like pieces with a lot of curves.”

“I prefer colors that are not so strong, like white celadon, purple, blue, and pink,” says Tessy. “I like red,” roars Jon.

“I enjoy what we’ve been doing up to now,” attests Tessy, confessing that married artists who are equally good in art can bloom together if their rivals are their old works, not each other.