In looking at these pots at the Field Museum, Alix [MacKenzie] and I both came to a conclusion individually but also collectively that the pots that really interested us were the pots that people had used in their everyday life, and we began to think - I mean, whether it was ancient Greece or Africa or Europe or wherever, the pots that people had used in their homes were the ones that excited us.

We were living with Bernard [Leach] in his home. He had a fantastic collection of early English and Japanese and Chinese and Korean pots and German pots, contemporary English work as well. And we had access to this collection.

I find it really enriching to make pots which people are using and which they come in contact with, not only visually in their homes but tactilely - when they pick them up, when they wash them after dinner, and so on and so forth.

Looking back on it now, I understand why that was not possible [to express ourselves], because the pottery employed a dozen people, not all of whom are making pots. And these people had families, children, and they had to have a wage that would allow them to raise their family and they had to get a paycheck every Friday afternoon. So if we had not made pots that would sell it, would not have been possible for these people to be employed.

Robert von Neumann taught painting, and when I finally got into a painting class of his, he reacted in much the same way.

It was a wonderful opportunity. And so for two and a half years we lived with [Bernard] Leach.

[In the Field Museum of Natural History] we could see very simple, primitive, hand-built pottery from Babylonia and ancient Egypt and so forth, Greece. We could see the most sophisticated things that came out of the Orient - Japan, Korea, and China - some few pieces of European porcelain, majolica [tin glazed earthenware], and that sort of thing. But they had a marvelous collection.