Robin Hopper is an accomplished ceramic artist living in Metchosin, just outside of Victoria. In 1984, he was instrumental in getting a number of artists together to start an art school in Metchosin called the Metchosin International Summer School of the Arts (MISSA), for professional artists, serious students and teachers, which takes place at Pearson College of the Pacific. He was a colleague of Jack's. (interviewed by Angela Andersen, Metchosin, B.C., February 2001)

How did you know Jack Wise?
Jack Wise came to the summer school and taught with us for 4 or 6 years, and had a major impact on people's approach to the use of simple imagery with the use of a brush. He was teaching, most of the time, non-character calligraphy. One year, and I think this was the only time he ever taught it, if I can recall, he taught mandala painting.

Postcard From the Rock Jack Wise

He had an incredible influence, and he still does. Jack had an amazing effect on all of the students who worked with him and he had an amazing presence - he had spent a lot of time in Tibet and India and he had some of the aura of a guru, in the true sense of guru, through just the fact that he was there - he hardly said anything much to his students. He was a man of very, very few words, and some people found that frustrating. But his "non-words" were immense in the way that people were affected by them. When he was on campus, even when he was sick and on campus, he was still having a major effect by not saying anything. [laughs] A lot of people sort of wanted more in terms of verbal interaction, but they just didn't get it in Jack. But one word might speak volumes. And the way that he sort of qualified the student's work, he would have his chop, which is his mark, his stamp, and it was a great honour to have him put his chop on your work. And so people would be going up to him and he'd be giving them projects and so on.

As a potter, do you feel that there was any mutual influence going on?
Yes. Jack loved my work and I loved his work and we did trade, like most artists tend to trade. I think a lot of potters are very strongly influenced by the Far East. If you look at the three cultures of Japan, China and Korea, in painting and in ceramics, they're both very much intertwined, if you get beyond the visual image and delve into the reasons why, which is a sort of spiritual approach and spiritual involvement with the material. Largely, it's the depth of understanding of what's behind the artwork that you see, whether it's a pot or whether it's a painting. It's that spiritual understanding that the artist has put into it, from his knowledge and learning. It manifests itself in lots of different ways for different people.