Isa Rodriguez: I'm Isa Rodriguez
Dylan Cale Jones: and I'm Dylan Cale Jones
Isa Rodriguez: and this is Practice, Practice. And today we are talking to Amy Sanders de Melo. Amy, would you like to introduce yourself?
Amy Sanders de Melo: Yeah, I am Amy Sanders de Melo. I'm based out of Tulsa, Oklahoma and I am a ceramic artist.
Dylan Cale Jones: So, Amy, first we want to talk about what creativity was like for you as you were growing up.
Amy Sanders de Melo: Creativity was all around me. I spent the early years of my childhood between the U. S. and Colombia, and I was born in Miami, Florida. So, the first two and a half years of my life, my mom was taking me to the beach every day. I was swimming in the water and playing in the sand.
And then when we were in Bogota with my family, I think I was immersed in a completely different culture, just different sounds, different food, different music. Even the way that my family speaks sounds very musical. So that, I think that was really beautiful. I don't have a lot of memories of that, but I do believe that was deeply ingrained in me as a person.
And then my dad bought a farm, when I was four, in Oklahoma, so that's why we moved out here. And from the age of 4 to 18, I was surrounded by animals and playing outside and helping my dad build and fix things. And that was hard in a lot of ways, but it was also really magical as an adult looking back on that time.
Dylan Cale Jones: Yeah, that sounds really fun.
Amy Sanders de Melo: Yeah. I mean, my dad and I would take our horses on rides. We did a lot of trail rides. When we rode around the farm, we would pretend like we were outlaws trying to cross the river, which was really just a creek. And we had to make sure we had enough to survive with us, which, you know, we just packed snacks and like a lunch into our saddlebags. And, you know, maybe don't tell my mom this, but she was like the bad guy that we were running away from, which my parents are very much in love.
But, you know, as a kid, it was just a fun way of playing around on the farm.
Dylan Cale Jones: Were you also doing things that people conventionally think of as creative like drawing or painting or anything like that?
Amy Sanders de Melo: Yeah, at school, I loved to draw. I loved to paint. That was typically the activity that my closest childhood friends and I loved to do after school or just, you know, during our free time.
You know how kids are. They usually assign like whoever I is the most creative at drawing or whoever has the best handwriting to draw the posters or make all the signage. And so that was typically me and my best friend and so our peers were identifying us as the creative ones and I think we ran with that and embraced it.
Dylan Cale Jones: And did you have any examples of adults in your life who were creative who you sort of like learned how to be creative from?
Amy Sanders de Melo: Yeah, again, I would go back to my parents. My mom is super beautiful, but she also just has really great style and expresses herself through how she dresses and how she fixes her hair.
And on top of that, she also really has a deeper appreciation for the arts. So she was teaching me about all kinds of artists from a young age and took me to museums. And she wouldn't say that she is creative herself, but she definitely had such a passion for artists that sharing that with me was just natural for her.
And then my dad is just a creative problem solver, designer, builder. Actually, he didn't finish high school. He ran away from home at 16, but he has always, had a mind that's looking for solutions to everyday problems. And then he's also trying to make every day fun. And so I think I got a lot of that from him.
Isa Rodriguez: That's really nice. That's really cool. Were your parents supportive of you in your creative endeavors?
Amy Sanders de Melo: Absolutely. They love, to help me with my projects. And if I had crazy ideas, you know, my dad would try to help me make those things happen. And again, on a farm, there's a lot of resources. You can utilize what's around you. And so I find myself doing that in my current practice.
But I think, as I was going into college, they both were a little bit concerned by my choice to do art school. And I think that had a lot of layers because I have a genetic disorder. So I'm losing my vision over time.
So I think all three of us, myself included, were wondering, like, ' Why would you do film if you might become blind?' Like that doesn't totally make a lot of sense in terms of security. But they never told me I couldn't do it, but I think they had concerns, for sure.
Isa Rodriguez: Yeah, that makes sense.
Dylan Cale Jones: Wow. And what was that decision like for you personally? To choose to do that, knowing that you might lose your own sight.
Amy Sanders de Melo: It was very, very hard at the time. So just to backtrack a little bit, I got my diagnosis at the age of 12. So I think for a lot of us, it's hard to remember exactly what we were like at the age of 12, but imagine being told, "Okay, one day in the future, you will be blind."
And you don't quite know when that's gonna happen because there's no set time frame. It might happen in your adulthood at some point but adulthood feels so far and so broad. I questioned for years what my path should be.
And then in high school I had really really supportive friends, but I remember one of my closest friends at that time saying, "Would you rather spend the next few years of your life, while you have your vision, doing what you absolutely love and what you're passionate about? Or would you rather not and choose a safer path and then always wonder, like, what if I had done that?"
So I think I took that to heart at the time. And art school is much more different than I expected it to be. There's a lot of different pathways that you can take after graduating. And so I'm glad that I chose to go into the art field, but it was, it was not an easy choice in the beginning.
Dylan Cale Jones: Sure. That sounds really great that you had that friend to offer that support though.
Amy Sanders de Melo: Yeah. Yeah. She, she's wonderful.
Dylan Cale Jones: It's amazing. I want to reflect on this story that you've told us. This uncertainty about your sight, and then also this uncertainty about how you would choose your path in education and your career. And it sounds really challenging because there's uncertainty on both sides, right? Like, there's no way that you can know.
Amy Sanders de Melo: Absolutely. I know I keep going back to my parents, but I, I really, really believe that they've equipped me in so many ways for the unknown and for resiliency.
My mom is an immigrant. She moved here knowing absolutely no one, didn't know the language. She knew my dad, but they didn't even speak each other's languages. They communicated with a dictionary that they carried for two years. And, watching her learn the language, become a citizen, go back to school —after she was already a dentist in Colombia and had her own practice— and re-enter the workforce here... I don't know how she did it, I truly don't. I believe, 'Okay, I come from that woman. Like I too am capable of hard things.'
And then my dad, he ran away from an abusive father at 16 and, you know, never finished school and has taught himself so much, even just what he has accomplished in his lifetime.
You know, he's in his 70s now, but he built our homes. He raised all these animals and he's created these huge gardens and actually produced food for us. So I really believe that the two of them together have really given me the tools.
And they never treated me differently. They never treated me as a kid who couldn't achieve something. And I really appreciate that. Not to say that my childhood was perfect. There was a lot of tragedy. There was definitely hard days, but being where I'm at now, and looking back, it's much easier to see the areas where they taught me how to do what I'm doing now.
Dylan Cale Jones: Sure.
Isa Rodriguez: I can't imagine trying to cope with that kind of information as a young person. I think back to 12 year old me and I'm like, I would not have known what to do with something that required me to think into the future at all.
Amy Sanders de Melo: I mean, it was devastating. I will say that. And I, I think my parents were just as devastated as me, if not more, but they didn't necessarily show that to me. Society is still getting better at equipping families for dealing with these types of things, but I remember my doctor telling me that and then we just left and we were given no resources.
We were never given, um, like a support group or a recommendation for a therapist. Like, I think those would have helped us tremendously.
Dylan Cale Jones: Yeah.
Amy Sanders de Melo: And it's shocking to think back. Like, how could you tell a child and their family " Oh, this, this child is going to become blind at some point." And not give them any resources? Like that blows my mind now.
Isa Rodriguez: Yeah.
Amy Sanders de Melo: Now there's a lot of resources and there's a lot of community support, especially with the internet and social media. So I'm starting to tap into that now that I'm in my thirties. But it was a strange childhood at times. And it was definitely nights that I I thought that my life would end when my vision was gone. And it's hard to think about that now because I know that that's not true, but I don't know, it was definitely hard.
But again, I, think I'm naturally optimistic. I wake up in a good mood most days. So I was distracted from my diagnosis because I had other enriching things in my life, whether it was school or my friends or athletics or animals. You know, there were a lot of things that kind of kept me occupied. And I think it was when I was alone with my own thoughts, you know, at night that I would kind of wonder about the future. And then I would have to tell myself, like, you just don't know, so just don't think about it now and you just have to wait.
Isa Rodriguez: Just have to live it, I guess.
Amy Sanders de Melo: Yeah, and I think whenever my vision did start to change, because that happened first with my night vision. So (at) like, 17, 18 (years old), my vision started to change to the point where I didn't feel comfortable driving at night anymore.
And then, my vision changed a lot when I turned, like, 23, 24. That's when I lost my peripheral vision, and that's when I decided, okay, I shouldn't drive at all. That was the biggest change, for sure, giving up driving. That's almost 10 years ago.
Isa Rodriguez: Wow. And especially in a place like Oklahoma where having a car or being able to drive is really an important part of how things are organized here.
Amy Sanders de Melo: Yeah. But the crazy thing is that is when Uber came to Oklahoma. Like it coincided perfectly with what I needed.
Isa Rodriguez: Great timing.
Amy Sanders de Melo: Yeah, it really was. And then I loved biking. So I was already cycling a lot in college just to get to classes. I still cycle now. I try to stick to like paved pathways, but I'm moving at a much slower pace, so it's doable.
Isa Rodriguez: That's awesome. Yeah.
Amy Sanders de Melo: Yeah. I love it.
Dylan Cale Jones: Wow.
Isa Rodriguez: So Amy, you said in your introduction that you identify as a ceramic artist. Can you tell us a little bit about your ceramics?
Amy Sanders de Melo: Yeah. So I work out of a community studio called Red Heat Ceramics here in Tulsa. It's an artist run space. It's amazing. I absolutely love that space. We have some members that are in their 70s and they are a wealth of knowledge. And then we have some members that are taking their first classes and getting affiliated with ceramics. The founder is Whitney Forsyth. She is an incredible person just doing really wonderful things in our community. I work for the space as a staff member. I'm also a resident there. So I have a permanent space that I can create my work in and then, I help with some of the programming efforts there.
Isa Rodriguez: It sounds like you have a lot of creative support kind of all in one spot there.
Dylan Cale Jones: I'm curious about how you got into ceramics since it sounds like you studied film when you were in undergrad.
Amy Sanders de Melo: In undergrad, I predominantly studied filmmaking and digital fabrications. But I also took sculpture classes because I was interested in furniture building and making lamps and lighting. And then I just happened to take a ceramics class at a local clay studio instead of at my university.
I think I was wanting a break from the pressures of art school and the pressures of some of my professors. And it was really liberating. It felt like I could let my mind wander and try new things and make mistakes without the consequences of a grade. I just fell in love with this aspect of making imperfect objects, and I think I had been striving for perfection as a kid in my academics and carried that into college, and I think that's when I let go of all of that.
It was very therapeutic. And then on top of that, people actually wanted to buy my work. And so that opened this door to an income stream that I hadn't experienced yet up until that point, because in video and film, you're not exactly selling your experimental videos to people.
But with ceramics, I was creating these objects that people wanted to bring into their homes. And so I did start taking ceramic classes at my art school in my final two years and then was getting into shows with my ceramic work by the time I was graduating. So I stuck with that.
Dylan Cale Jones: That's really relatable for me too, that experience of making art in academia and then making art specifically in clay at a community studio and really loving the experience of not being evaluated all the time. And the, support of the other students and the instructors and technicians at the ceramics studio being like, " Yeah, like, what do you want to make? We'll help you make it."
Isa Rodriguez: Well, ceramics occupies both spaces really elegantly. Right? You can make something that's really, really beautiful and someone can have an everyday relationship to it beyond just the visual, which I really appreciate. I really appreciate how ceramics feel when I'm using them.
Amy Sanders de Melo: Me too.
Isa Rodriguez: Can you tell us a little bit about a recent piece that you've worked on?
Amy Sanders de Melo: Hmm. Yes. I started making tea bowls. I love the way they look. I have always kept them on this pedestal of being an object that's too beautiful for me to make. I'm not sure why, but I had never made a teabowl before. And I took them to a show actually in Baltimore and they were hard to let go of because I love them so much.
Dylan Cale Jones: What sorts of forms are you used to making?
Amy Sanders de Melo: I do make a lot of straight cylinder cups. I do a lot of vases. I do some bowls and plates, but not as often. To be honest, a lot of my shapes are very simple because I go back and I'm writing braille on the surface.
And so a lot of my work is really quiet. It kind of requires that a person comes in closely and spends time with the object. If they want to look at the text, if they want to feel the text, they're actually picking it up and touching it.
I think there's something just really special about a vessel that you're actually bringing to your lips. And, you know, Isa, earlier you were talking about the intimacy of ceramics and how people are bringing these objects into their everyday lives.
Amy Sanders de Melo: And I do think about that a lot. Like, we all have our favorite mug that if it's clean and in the cabinet, that's the first one you reach for. So, I like creating objects that people make a part of their routines and their relationships with other people. You know, oftentimes you are sharing a meal with another person. And the vessels that you choose to use for those moments are really special.
Isa Rodriguez: How do you choose the words that you put on your vessels?
Amy Sanders de Melo: I struggle with that sometimes. Some days, it comes to me very quickly, and other days it takes me a lot of time to think about what I want to put on them, but I've started keeping lists, so it's a little bit easier for me to keep track of what phrases to put on there. But a lot of it is meditative. It's meant to either encourage self reflection or encourage bringing people together.
I think much of my work is about creating space for grieving and creating space for healing. So a lot of the phrases can be just as simple as "breathe" or "slow down." And then some of them are, you know, a little bit more personal.
So, one that I used when I first started using Braille was, "Am I losing myself, or am I becoming myself?" Because as my vison changes, I've been wrestling with that question of, ' Am I becoming the person that I'm supposed to become, or am I losing the person that I was always meant to be?' And the reality is, everyone is evolving. We're all evolving and I'm never going to be the same version of myself.
Dylan Cale Jones: I think that phrase and thinking is really interesting too. I mean there's this emphasis on ceramics being visual objects and also being tactile objects.
I see that same intersection with braille, right? It's this transformation of a visual language into a tactile language. And when I think about you and I think about your work, I can't help but imagine holding the vessel and feeling the braille and knowing what the vessel looks like, and then closing my eyes and imagining what the vessel feels like without seeing it.
Dylan Cale Jones: So, I think all of those intersections are really interesting and related to what you're talking about.
The medium that you're talking about, I think has a really interesting relationship to it in terms of it being not one or the other, right? It's not losing yourself or becoming yourself. It's both just like the vessel isn't just a tactile body, but it's also a visual thing and it's not one or the other.
Isa Rodriguez: I remembered what I wanted to say just before that is in the question of losing and becoming, that when I see your work, I feel strongly that it's work that only you can make.
And that's something that sort of happens across ceramics. Any vessel is something that only that particular artist can make exactly that way since ceramic carries so much of the artist's hand in it.
Dylan Cale Jones: So, Amy, outside of your ceramics practice, what else is going on in your life and what do you have to balance with your art practice?
Amy Sanders de Melo: Outside of ceramics, I do like spending time in community engaged projects. So I spend a lot of time working with Sunny Days Mural Festival and I try to say yes to other opportunities that involve sharing knowledge.
I think that's really valuable in the arts community. And then beyond that, I love being outside. So I try to spend a lot of time outside, whether that's walking or cycling and then gardening. And my partner and I love hiking.
And then, we spend a lot of time with our close friends. We have a lot of friends that live in our neighborhood, so we'll just walk over and have dinner with them. And then my partner has a niece and nephew that are twins and they're about to turn five. So we spend a lot of time with those kids.
Isa Rodriguez: What do you find is really difficult to balance with your creativity and your creative practice?
Amy Sanders de Melo: I do think that I struggle with balancing deadlines. Once I have a deadline, it can kind of take over all things. I'm sure both of you can relate. Just being an artist, one of the challenges is that you are always, always applying for opportunities. So, I tell other people who are not in the art industry, you know, "Imagine applying for a job 40, 50, 60 times a year, if not more." Like, they would look at us like we're crazy and they do, they don't believe that.
So, you know, when you think of all the opportunities that you're trying to apply for and very often don't get, it feels like an endless cycle that can be exhausting. I love it. I don't know why. I do like applying for things and I think part of it is I love writing. But when I have a deadline, I think that's when everything else kind of falls to the wayside a little bit.
So that is an area that I'm trying to develop better habits about. So working on the applications earlier and kind of spreading that over several days instead of doing it all the day before or the day of.
Isa Rodriguez: Yeah, that can be really challenging. Something I've found is that college sets us up to be doing everything, at most, two weeks before it's due.Like it sort of ingrained for me a pattern of working right up until the deadline. And then as I get older, I'm like, Oh, that's not healthy for me.
And we had, for example, a book release recently and I scheduled nothing for the day before and nothing for the day after because I was like, 'I don't want to be running around right up until we go to the store for the release. I want to have time that is reflection or rest or whatever.' And then of course people were asking me to do things right, right up until the end. And I had to say like, "I'm booked. I'm already booked for Saturday. I cannot add anything." And they don't know that my calendar is booked with "do nothing" but it's, it's full.
Amy Sanders de Melo: That's smart though. That's really smart. I wish more artists did that.
You should block off your calendar and have a do nothing day because like you said, I feel like we so rarely take the time to acknowledge accomplishments and celebrate them and reflect on them because when you install a show, for example, there's so much activity and commotion around that. And then when it's over, it feels a little bit of like a crash period.
It's so valuable to just spend time with yourself and write down or just think about the things that went well, and the things that didn't go well, and the things that you learned from that experience.
Isa Rodriguez: A lot of the time, if I'm at a show I've installed or if I'm at a release or something, someone will ask me, "Okay, what's next?" And it's like, I haven't even finished this yet. And of course I do think about what's next, but sometimes I wish I just had some space before I had to already be deciding the next move.
Dylan Cale Jones: That's something that I've been thinking about. In the past when I had done exhibition openings it was, in part, like a celebration. But a big part of it was me finally getting the opportunity for people to interact with the work and receive it and then for me to receive how they were receiving it. And there was all of this anxiety around it of how my work was going to be received or interpreted whether it was going to sell or not all of this other kind of stuff. And with this book release that we had recently I made the decision where I was like, whatever happens is fine. What I want to frame this as is just like a celebration for me of this project.
Isa Rodriguez: Can you tell us a little bit about like what a typical day looks like in your practice?
Amy Sanders de Melo: Every day looks different . I am fortunate that I can do this full time. So I made that shift right after the pandemic. I decided I wanted to go into art full time and making that happen has been a lot of work.
You know, there are definitely the hard months and the low months of not as much income. So, I'm still figuring out stability in that, but I do feel a lot more confident. Being in year three of that versus year one.
I don't necessarily go to the studio every day. I work from home sometimes. And sometimes a day of work or a day of creativity is really just being out in the world. Whether we're hiking or just spending time outside, I consider that a part of my creative process because you need that rest. Like you need that intake of beauty and peace just to be able to pour that back out into your work.
I typically try to get to the studio early if I am going in because I work best in the morning. And that's when the studio is a little bit quieter. We work out of a community studio, so there's activity throughout the day. And when there's classes in session, I know that I don't work as well. I try to spend some time writing, writing ideas down and exploring different concepts on paper before I actually start working with clay. But there are definitely days where I just want to go in and start throwing and, and making things on the wheel. I do try to make a production list for the day and knock that out.
But I do value eating three meals a day. I do value time with my loved ones, and I try to get a good night of sleep. So those are things that are kind of non-negotiables for me. Which they like seem like such basic things, but I do think that for a lot of artists, those things can get sacrificed so quickly. And for me, I just know I'm not in a good mood if I don't get my sleep or if I don't eat my meals and have water.
Isa Rodriguez: It sounds like you're organizing your days around the environment that works best for your creativity, which includes resting and time with loved ones and eating and sleeping. It's as crucial to making sure that you're ready for the studio as like the studio being quiet or organized. And I think that that's a really valuable insight.
Amy Sanders de Melo: Yeah. Yeah. I think, you know, if I had my own home studio, I think my structures would be a little bit different.
But this is the setup that I have and I don't think I would trade it. I would still choose the community studio over having a home studio if that was an option.
Isa Rodriguez: It sounds like you're really getting a valuable community experience, right? To be with other people creating is totally different than to be sort of siloed alone, making things.
Amy Sanders de Melo: Yeah. Yeah. And I, I love that people can share resources in that space. I try to be an open book in that space and share about my failures and successes.
Dylan Cale Jones: Yeah. I think those spaces are so important.
Something that I love about going into the community ceramic studio is that the teacher-student relationship breaks down a little bit and everybody's a student and everybody's a teacher and everybody has knowledge to share and everybody has something to learn.
That environment feels so full of life and potential to me that I just love being in those spaces.
Amy Sanders de Melo: Yeah, I wholeheartedly agree. At our studio, we have two 18 year old boys that just joined. They're finishing up high school and they have such a tremendous amount of energy that it's kind of incredible to watch.
We have a member that's in his 70s that I've mentioned and he is so invigorated by these young boys asking him questions because he knows so much technically and they are at his house like firing his kiln and kind of going a little crazy with it.
But it's, it's been a lot of fun. It's been really exciting in there these days.
Dylan Cale Jones: Yeah, I think that intergenerational aspect is really important too and that's something that we see a lot at the studio that we work at. There's people in high school and there's retired people and people in their 30s and 40s and getting that intergenerational exchange of knowledge, I think it's also really exciting.
Amy Sanders de Melo: Yeah, it is.
Isa Rodriguez: So is there anything in your practice or in your life that's changing right now?
Amy Sanders de Melo: I am trying to broaden my audience and I'm also trying to raise my prices. Which is my everlasting challenge because people always tell me that my work is underpriced. I think every artist probably struggles with that, just trying to figure out how to price your work.
I've been trying to get my work into spaces outside of Oklahoma. I still sell work in Oklahoma, but it is nice to have my work in galleries or museum shops in other places. And knowing that complete strangers are connecting with my work and wanting to share it with their loved ones, whether they're blind or not, is really beautiful. So that's been a new thing.
I went to Baltimore recently for the American Craft Council Marketplace and that's the first time I've ever traveled with lots of ceramics across the country. And it was terrifying and amazing and I had such a great time and honestly, the audience was so lovely.
So i'm trying to be more open to things like that. It is a little challenging not driving, but I'm really grateful to have a partner that looks to find solutions with me and for me.
And I am trying to cut back how much production I do because I'm noticing a little bit of wear on my body. My hands just can't take a lot of production back to back. I'm trying to create more rest and more time for healing. Easier said than done.
Isa Rodriguez: I agree. Yeah. Yeah.
Dylan Cale Jones: Do you mind if I ask about how you think about your pricing?
Amy Sanders de Melo: No, not at all. I'm, I'm very open about all of this because it is such a journey. So in undergrad, I took a class called the business of art. I learned a lot about marketing and setting up a website and applying for grants and pricing.
So that professor gave us a formula and I, I never could figure out how to get it to work with ceramics. The amount of time I was putting into work, it just didn't equate for someone being brand new in their career. I could not charge what I wanted to charge for a cup.
So I've toyed around with pricing. Sometimes it's just an instinctual number. I do try to ask for feedback from peers. So I'll ask people in my community studio a lot about their thoughts on my pricing. And then I try to ask people outside of the art industry. Like " What would you pay for this?" A lot of times those numbers don't line up, so I kind of go somewhere in the middle.
But I did the Emerging Artist Program through the American Craft Council, and our cohort facilitator, Gwen— also an incredible resource, and wonderful mentor— she and I spent a lot of time talking about my pricing and it was really hard for me to adopt the prices that she recommended because she thought, just for an example, my cups were priced at $60 and she was thinking that they would sell really well at $120. So double what I had them at.
I just couldn't fathom that. I knew that that wouldn't work in the market that I was in and that's when she told me, "That's not your market. You need to get outside of Oklahoma. Get your work on the East Coast. Get your work on the West Coast, and just see what happens."
So that's what I started to do, and that's when I was able to price my work at a fair price. That's a hard thing to do when your audience is used to a certain price point, but as an artist, you have to realize that your time is just as valuable as everyone else in every other industry.
In most other industries, you know, you're getting a raise. You're working up to a certain salary point. And I think a lot of times that artists, we stay at the same price point for so, so long, for too long.
Isa Rodriguez: I also observe that sometimes when someone's not interested in buying the work, they will give the excuse that the work is too expensive.
And what they really mean is that they don't want to buy it, but it's impolite to say they don't want to buy it. And so people will say, "Oh, I can't afford it."
They feel like they have to say something. It closes the conversation, right? And gives them an opportunity to leave, but it doesn't actually maybe reflect that the prices are too high.
Amy Sanders de Melo: Right.
Dylan Cale Jones: Yeah, and before I had done tabling, I would feel sort of uncomfortable approaching tables where I wasn't sure if I was going to buy something or not. And after having the experience of tabling, now I approach every table and just talk to them whether or not i'm interested in buying it. I don't have that anxiety I'm, just like 'I'm just gonna talk to this person.'
And like in my experience in tabling, I don't know if I'm going to sell things and hopefully I do, but what's rewarding is just getting into genuine conversation with people about the work that I make, and often those connections turn into something later, even if I don't sell the thing on my table.
Amy Sanders de Melo: I love that a lot because when we go to markets and we set up our tables, it's so easy to forget that there's a whole network of artists that are around you, and that network is full of so many resources.
You know, when you go from a competitive mindset to a collaborative mindset and a community mindset, so many doors open. So I agree with you. It's a great time to make connections and learn about other processes, learn about how other people are pricing their work, and, you know, potentially meet a future collaborator.
Dylan Cale Jones: Yeah.
Isa Rodriguez: Mm hmm. Okay, let's get into our final questions. Our first question for you is, what advice do you have for your younger self?
Amy Sanders de Melo: I would say, take care of your body and invest in yourself.
I think I had a lot of fear when I was younger about jumping into art making full time, and even though other people around me were telling me to make that leap, it was really scary to do.
Again, it's easier to say that in hindsight, but I wish I had invested in myself a little bit sooner.
Isa Rodriguez: That's great advice. That's excellent advice.
Dylan Cale Jones: And do you have any advice that you would give to your future self?
Amy Sanders de Melo: That's such a hard one. Again, I would say take care of your body. Hopefully I can still be making ceramics and I really hope that I continue to have an openness to other people asking me questions. I've never mentored anyone, but I would love to do that one day.
I've had some incredible, incredible mentors. I got to work this past year with Anita Fields, who is just phenomenal. She is just so warm and so full of knowledge. I look at that and I feel really inspired. So I hope that I'm in a similar place where I'm able to offer that to people.
And be able to share with younger people.
Dylan Cale Jones: Cool.
Isa Rodriguez: Yeah. Fantastic.
Amy Sanders de Melo: Yeah. Thank you.
Isa Rodriguez: Well, Amy, thank you so much for this conversation. I really appreciate how open you've been and I can't wait to see where your work goes.
Amy Sanders de Melo: Thank you. I appreciate you both having me. This was really fun.
Dylan Cale Jones: Yeah. Thanks, Amy.
Practice Practice is created by Isa Rodriguez and Dylan Cale Jones. The music you heard in this episode is by Kate Jarboe.
Isa Rodriguez: This season of Practice Practice is funded by a THRIVE Grant from the Oklahoma Visual Arts Coalition and the Andy Warhol Foundation.
Dylan Cale Jones: THRIVE Grants fund community-driven, artist-led projects across the state of Oklahoma. Learn more and apply at ovac-ok.org
Amy Sanders de Melo: I'm Amy Sanders de Melo and you're listening to Practice, Practice.