This planter is pretty big. I made it last summer, so when I say that I like it, I'm not being blinded by partiality. If I still like it after a year, then maybe I'm right.
I like the size of it. When my skills enable me, I intend to do a lot of big pieces. I like the presence of a large piece. With handbuilding, I can actually make things quite large, but on the wheel, I can't control the clay yet.
I like the surface. I purposely left the coils visible. I could have rubbed the surface with a damp sponge until it was completely smooth - I've done that - but I wanted it to have a crude, organic feeling, as if it had grown, not been made. I never intended to glaze or decorate the surface.
I also like the usefulness of the vessel. Strictly speaking, it's not useful. It's decorative. But when you make a planter, you're making something in the service of the plant.
I'm not ready emotionally to produce something that I would point at and say: this is a Sculpture. Just as it's hard for me to put some lines of my writing in front of someone and proclaim that they're a Poem. Perhaps if I didn't use capital letters, I'd be more comfortable with the idea. But I believe that Art deserves capital letters.
When you make things like flowerpots or bowls, even vases intended for flowers, you're making something that should be decorative, pretty, but not something that makes a statement, like a self-proclaimed work of art. Though of course it does make a statement - under its breath.
Notoriously, the question, "What is art?" has been answered in many ways during the history of Western culture since the Renaissance. Indeed, the existence of the category, "Art," is far from a cultural universal, and the notion that a painting, a poem, a sonata, and a play are all works of art, and, in that sense, have something in common, is rather odd, when you think of the extreme differences among the things that we regard as art.
So if I sat down in front of a lump of clay and said to myself, "I intend to create a Work of Art out of this lump of clay," I would probably inhibit myself so severely, that I would never touch the clay. But I do intend to produce works that partake of art.