Occupants of Interplanetary Craft: Tom Krempa's Universe

Were I to ask you to close your eyes and imagine San Francisco in the early 1960s, I'm fairly certain your mind would be littered with thoughts of hippies and free love and hallucinogens. I doubt that you'd even notice a boy about eleven years old making his way back and forth to the Adobe Arts Center every weekend, an eager student of the kick wheel. His name was Tom Krempa and as a budding adolescent in the middle of the San Francisco Renaissance, he'd found an unlikely sanctuary amongst the other ceramic artists in the neighborhood.

They liked Tom; he was a cute kid with an engaging personality that has yet to desert him, and he wasn't afraid to get splattered head to toe with red mud, the kind that never comes out of your clothes. A kick wheel uses no electricity, so it was no small feat for Tom to operate one as a kid; he had to keep it going constantly in order to keep his piece centered. As Tom got better and better, he started to make things at Christmas time and sell them door to door. He entered a few contests, too, liking the fact that every win got his picture in the paper. He thought like an entrepreneur before he could even spell it.After high school, Tom joined the Coast Guard and was able to attend college on the G.I. Bill. He took a pottery class from an instructor trained in Japan who told him that talent was being able to throw one hundred of the same pieces the same way each time, so Tom got busy and learned how to do it. But when you look at Tom's shop today, Village River Arts in Asheville, NC, a far cry from California, you won't see any of that. In fact, you might not know quite what you are looking at. I challenge you to try to look away though. You'll be mesmerized and maybe a little freaked out. Why? Well, meet The Babysitter:

Now, if you've acclimated to The Babysitter, I'd like you to meet Stephanie. One of the first things I asked Tom when I interviewed him was, "What was the inspiration behind Stephanie?" I was expecting to hear that she was a composite of horrendous ex-girlfriends, but instead, Tom told me that, "I only name them because I have to, like when I enter them in contests. Otherwise I wouldn't name them at all." I felt relieved after that. The next question I had was, "How did you make her hair?" He puts holes in the clay and inserts strands of metal in them. In fact, most of Tom's sculptures are mixed media involving clay and metal. He also paints and is currently preparing a few giclee prints to sell since less expensive art is selling better than high end art in this economy.

If Tom had his way, however, he wouldn't be marketing his art in this economy or this country or even this planet thanks to a fascination with Metaphysics. He's fascinated with a world beyond the one he wakes up to everyday and channels that energy into each piece he creates. Many of Tom's pieces are purchased by businesses or public agencies like this piece, The Visitors, that resides in the city of Everett, Washington in their public art collection.

Tom's existentialism has produced an army of gift offerings for any new forms of life we encounter now or in centuries to come. And while he may ponder the universe, at the end of the day, Tom Krempa is a 'right place, right time' kind of guy. He doesn't fear dry spells that may last for a few months because he knows he always comes back better. Inspiration finds him everywhere, and though he freely admits that art is a positive place to go to when you need to escape, he's ever-conscious of the business side as well. After all, now he can spell entrepreneur. I think those hippies would be so proud.

Tom Krempa's shop, Village River Arts, can be found at 1000Markets.