Reason For Being: Jochen Holz

Staying alert...

Wake up calls come in surprising ways, and the current lockdown feels certainly like that.

As for me, reflecting on it, reading about it, talking to friends and family about it has become a central part of my day during these “weird times”.

The studio life has become just a little calmer and more reflective too, beautiful springtime as a backdrop for a very gloomy outlook.

I am thinking a lot about the chances for change and what it all means for the future. It all has a slightly unreal serenity and calmness about it still, but I have no doubt that the consequences will be very real, far reaching and profound.

I love to drink tea during the day in the studio and I am now in the long habit of punctuating my working day with lots of little tea ceremonies. Tea is an amazingly varied and multifaceted drink, sometimes even resembling some of the positive qualities I think are also defining us now; solitude, calm, introspection and routine, withdrawal and attentiveness, care and self-reliance, waking up and also “staying alert”.

For my Instagram take over I will share my tea experience, some glass making and some general studio impressions.

Jochen Holz, Glass Artist
East London, 24 May 2020
Reason for Being