Featured in print as one of America's Leading Contemporary Ceramic Artists, Christina allows us into her studio to talk about her exploration of the Heart. Christina lives in Rhode Island and teaches at the Rhode Island School of Design. Music arrange by Cassandra Tribe, text from the interview with Christina Bertoni.

That idea has grown into The Little Flower Presents, a series of video, text and audio features on artists and venues around the globe. Why artists and venues? It started out of pure selfishness, I am an artist, writer and performer - I need heroes to look up to and I need to be able to see that there are other people out there who are trying just as hard as I am to make a difference. And then, I found out that there are lots of people out there who are looking for the same thing.

I pitched the idea to the Culture Network and a few editors of various literary, art, and poetry magazines. While we all liked it, we all saw the same two problems. One, how would the artists and venues be selected? And two, who would be the "face" of the The Little Flower Presents, and guess who got picked?  It took a year to come up with the criteria but it was worth the effort because it is giving the project a real sense of integrity and direction. The second problem was important because who ever became the "face" of it all was also going to bear the brunt of defining (and sometimes defending) the criteria.

I teach from and all of my own work is guided by the principals outlined in the Rules of the Sublime by Longinus. These "rules" were written in 400 BC and what they basically state is that everything has to come from a purpose that is larger then yourself. Yet, it has to do this in a way that doesn't lose its personal meaning. The sublime emphasizes work that transcends the individual and their culture and has the potential to effect the culture of humanity because it never loses what makes it personal.

What we are trying to do is to recognize and highlight artists and efforts that approach their "genre" with a sense of integrity, care, and responsibility. We are trying to find artists who are aware of the impact of what they do and this drives them, in all aspects of their life, to do their best. Artists who know that while inspiration may come from some deeply personal sources, art can speak in a language that is universal and they take care with the message they present.

These are people who see the role of the arts in the community, not as entertainment or solely for personal expression; but as a means to teach, transform and enlighten. The focus of what they choose to present is rooted within not only understanding the human experience, but our relationship to the whole - whether that be our communities or a sense of the universe.

We are trying to do this in a way that even someone who has no interest in painting or sculpture or writing or whatever - is going to stop for a moment, get involved with it, and walk away with a renewed sense of possibility for their own lives. The features, especially the video features, aren't really for the arts community but for everyone else that surrounds it.

To help explain the focus of the selection process, the following is an excerpt from a lecture I gave at the 2^nd Annual U.S. Poets in Mexico Workshop where I was on the faculty with Anne Waldman, Mark Doty, Jonathan Harrington, Pedro Serrano and Martin Espada.