He's musician and builder, but don't call him sculptor
Soft-spoken and self-effacing, Bob Potts regales us with tales of his life’s many unexpected zigs and zags.
Call him a musician, a carpenter, a fix-anything tinkerer, a machinist, a gardener, a welder or a gearhead, but Potts declines the monikers “sculptor” or “artist.” But that is how those who appreciate, show and buy his graceful works think of him.
Born and raised in San Francisco, he recalls pleasant hours spent knuckles-deep in hot rod parts and motorcycle grease. From high school, he went to work at an engineering firm, thinking he might become a draftsman, but the suit-and-tie life didn’t suit him, so he joined the Navy, which is one of several reasons he wound up here. On leave, hitchhiking in search of the Watkins Glen racetrack, he got lost in a beautiful Finger Lakes town with a creek running through it, and fell in love with the region.
After his fortuitous Navy discharge, just before his ship headed off without him for the Cuban Missile Crisis, he returned to the West Coast and studied architecture, advertising and math, then signed on for an apprentice program with the carpenters’ union. His artist brother put him to work on a sculpture series, and let him live in and use part of his Berkeley studio; Bob, happily engrossed in building things, also fell in love with the Berkeley folk scene and the fiddle.
His first West Coast band, All Skate, performed on stilts and did well as street performers. A second, The Original Fat City String Band, formed with musicians Mac Benford and Walt Koken, did the southern string-band circuit, and busked on the streets of D.C., where they met the Smithsonian folklife curator Ralph Rinzler, who sent their subsequent band, the Highwoods String Band, with bassist Jennie Cleland and guitarist Doug Dorschug, on State Department tour South America.
Stateside, magician, historian, actor and Rongovian Embassy bartender Ricky Jay got them a gig at Ithaca’s old Salty Dog (now The Dock), and they toured West Coast venues with him. Finally, most of them settled in the Ithaca/Trumansburg/Mecklenburg area in the early 1970s, and, as the Highwoods’ fame spread, turned it into a sort of Mecca for string band musicians.
Potts supplemented his musician’s living with his carpentry skills, including work on the Rongovian Embassy. “Tony Potenza and I built the (brick) arch between rooms in 1976,” he said.
In Trumansburg, he met his wife, Ruth Potts, then a practicing midwife. He built their Stilwell Road home and, with her, raised three terrific kids. Along the way, he worked as a machinist developing cars, worked with Al Peckenpaugh restoring a boat, and finally, through an introduction by artist Annie Campbell, was hired on by Bob McGuire at Ithaca’s Rockstream Studios, working for 20 years as a builder of George Rhoades’ madcap kinetic sculptures; those works have found homes as nearby as the Sciencenter, and as far off as Japan, Israel and the Port Authority Bus Terminal.
While working with Rockstream, Potts built a studio in his 1850s vintage grain barn, where he could work on the Rockstream jobs, and where he also began putting together his own graceful works. McGuire and Rhoades were very supportive, he said.
In recent years, he has had shows of his mesmerizing kinetic sculptures at the Butler Institute of American Art in Youngstown, Ohio, and at Auburn’s Schweinfurth Museum invitational Made in New York show, where he won best of show one year. Internationally, he has shown at the M.A.D. (Mechanical Art Devices) Gallery in Geneva, Switzerland; at the Edwins Gallery in Jakarta, Indonesia; and at Art Dubai.
His latest project, with building partner Peckenpaugh, is restoration of a mid-century Crosley-powered H-modified sports racer with a fiberglass body. It was first raced in 1961.
“I love race cars, cars in general, nuts and bolts — I’m captured by the machine in any form,” Potts said. “I’m a builder. I’m a maker.”
Speaking of his long-term fondness for the Trumansburg community, he said, “I was really accepted here. Millspaugh’s (Hardware) was the first place that ever gave me credit, and nobody had ever given me credit before. Air, water, sustainability, locavore eating, people growing stuff, apple products, wine — it’s the best move I ever made.”
After many years, it’s good to see he’s receiving international recognition for and sales of his kinetic works. You can see short videos of his pieces in action, produced by Bryan Root, with music by Peter Dodge, on YouTube under “Bob Potts Kinetic Sculptures.” You’ll see he truly is a gifted artist, no matter what he says.
Open auditions
Trumansburg’s Encore Players Community Theatre is holding open auditions for the upcoming production of “The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance” by Jethro Compton, directed by Douglas Lockwood.
Auditions will be held at 7 p.m. March 2 and 2 p.m. March 5 at the Presbyterian Church Chapel, 69 E. Main St. Actors will be asked to perform a cold reading from the script and may present a short prepared monologue if they wish. Previous acting experience is preferred, but not necessary. They’re looking for teens and adults of all ages, as well as production people to work on costumes, props, set construction, tech and more.
Performance dates are April 28 through May 1. For more information, contact Encore Players at encoreplayers.ct@gmail.com, or call 607-387-3953.
Empty Bowls fundraiser
Clay artist Mary Ellen Salmon tells us that on March 6, there’ll be a community celebration with proceeds benefiting the Trumansburg Food Pantry.
Twenty dollars buys your choice of handmade bowl, thrown and glazed by Mary Ellen and her Salmon Pottery students. Fill your new bowl with soup from Good to Go, Crystal Lake at Americana Vineyards, Wrap It Up Café, Creekside, the Rongo, Hazelnut, Wide Awake Bakery, the Falls Restaurant or Word of Mouth Catering.
Tickets are available at Salmon Pottery, 79 E. Main St., from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturdays and Sundays, or at Good to Go, 21 E. Main St. Get two free raffle tickets when you buy your Empty Bowls ticket at the pottery. Kids 15 and younger are free. At Atlas Bowl, from 1 to 3 p.m. that day, bowling is half-price.
Julie Jordan returns
Reprising the popular, long-lost Vegetarian Nights at the Rongo, Julie Jordan, the inventor of the Wings of Life Salad, known for her cookbooks, her sorely missed Cabbagetown Café and her work in bringing vegetarian dishes to Wegmans, will be showering her veg magic on the Rongo’s kitchen on Wednesday and Thursday nights beginning in April.
However, TBT, or Tasty Burrito Thursday, starts now, and will feature $6.75 organic black bean burritos with beans from Potenza Organics ($8.75 with chicken, beef or pork).
And to further sweeten your evening, free music! This Thursday, it’s Gabe Tavares and Powder the Moon; on Feb. 25, it’s DNA, featuring guitarist Dan Scherer. On Feb. 26, it’s "Too Cool for School," a dual fundraising dance to gather support for the junior prom all-night sober rager and Femtastic's participation in One Billion Rising, a campaign to raise awareness about domestic violence. A short video will be made to submit to the worldwide dance party as part of the campaign at Onebillionrisimg.org. Rongo high school sound intern DJJ (also known as Jack Reynolds) will be mixing tunes.
Peggy Haine is writing the Ulysses Town Talk for David Wren for the next few months. You can reach her at peggyhaine.1@gmail.com.
Generous donor helps S-VE student buy lunch