Hi, fans of Yit
I’m Karena Lam, an actress
I’m also a fan of pottery
Three years ago, my two daughters began to learn pottery
Then due to the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic
I decided to escort them by myself
And I began to play with the clay when they attended the class and I fell in love with it
I come here at 7:30 am every day
Apartments in Hong Kong are generally small
There’s no Wi-Fi in the pottery room
I’m hardly distracted staying here
I slept over here for several times
Because of typhoons
Sometimes I do pottery for over ten or even twenty hours a day
I’m totally relaxed during the process
I listen to my body
There’re differences
Between shaping using white clay and clay with sand
Some are hand-pinched, not molded
I feel like learning how to be a decent person again
When I was self-assured
The baking might be a total failure
So I must be very humble
Due to the pandemic
A lot of people became unemployed
And they felt so down
Then I thought of doing the project
“Take Care You”
I molded 2,700 bowls
Then I broke them all to make an art installation
When the exhibition ended
I recycled the broken pieces
And remolded them
Into rice bowls
You can come and visit us in the Oil Street Art Space
Sharing with us all your bad feelings
Or anything you like
Then you can leave with a rice bowl
And continue your life
I saw lots of comments online
Some used my rice bowl while cooking at home
That’s a warmth from me in their daily life
Hong Kong’s New Vision Arts Festival invited me
To write a stage drama for them
I wanted to write about the mother-daughter relationship
It’s love and it could be possessiveness
There’s no dialogue in the show
Sometimes I play the mother and sometimes I play the daughter
I asked the director if I could make a baby head with clay
When water flowed down from its face
It looked like the baby was crying
Then you saw its face break and become out of shape
I think a mother and her daughter are mirror to each other
“The worst grade is 60”
“If you think I’m really bad, you can give me 40”
“I won’t mind if you give me 0”
July Rhapsody and Inner Senses are my first two movies
And I worked with Ann Hui
Jacky Cheung, Anita Mui, and Leslie Cheung
Such experiences let me know making a movie is sacred
I’m pretty sure I want to be an actress
“Go away. I don’t want to see you”
“Just cry. It will make you feel better”
It’s common that people think I should be satisfied with being a mother
And an actress
Why do I have so many dreams
Such as making pottery
But creating is a lifelong journey to me
Once my elder daughter even told me
“Mom, I think you love pottery more than me”
I said she was wrong
I won’t tell her to give up what she loves
The passion and love for one thing is rare
And it should be treasured
Speaking of my views about education
I think each child is an individual and they should be equally treated
My elder daughter is a teenager now
She’s around 12, or 13
And a child changes as he or she grows
So you need to change your ways of educating
And your ways of communicating as well
I don’t want stay in any stage of life
What I feel and think now didn’t appear in my mind
When I was 20
Now I really don’t like wearing makeup and taking pictures
Fitting, getting beauty treatments and coloring my hair
I have a lot of grey hair
I’m going to turn 45 after all
I often feel difficult to achieve a balance
But it’s strange that
You don’t make a fuss with it when you really love it
Although I’m tired and my hands are busy
I feel peace inside
This year I will do my part as an actress
And I will hold a solo exhibition of pottery
Right beside the family house of my grandfather
My grandfather made lacquer ware
I think pottery is an art creation
Which is worth learning for life
It teaches me to let it go
Life with no attachment is free
I’ve never thought of becoming an artist
I just want to be myself
And it’s hard enough to do my best