Body / Earth

Objects to hold / Transitions to embody / Landscapes to inhabit

Stoneware with wild clay inclusions from Abiquiu, NM
Anagama wood fired in Taos for 5 days in October + December 2024
Photos taken at Abiquiu Lake, Dec 2024

Body / Earth is made up of a grouping of solid ceramic shapes that are designed to be held and interacted with, alongside a larger basin which centers the work as a scaled up expression of one of the smaller forms. Each piece is made of a stoneware clay that has a small amount of Chinle formation clay from Abiquiu, which has a rich dark purple color. During the 4-day firing in Taos, the flame and ash create a surface that is completely unique to each piece and to that particular time and place of firing.

The pods are meant to be held and interacted with. The solidity of the form lends a feeling that the piece is a different kind of vessel – it doesn’t have space for physical things inside, but it can carry other things. Its feeling in the hand can make one feel safe and grounded. It can withdraw your attention from your hands and hold it, organize it, settle it. Use it to ground, to mediate, to fidget, to protect, to share, to go inward. It will hold the heat of your hands or your body, the heat of your being.

Each one is shaped from solid clay into forms that emerged organically from working the clay in my hands. I had in mind images of a seed, seed pod, bean, womb, embryo, or egg - vessels of life and growth. Each form bled into the next until I had a whole grouping of objects that reflected (just a fraction of) the universal forms of growth, creation, and transition. They represent not the before or the after - but the process itself of change and transition. I find these to be grounding forms to hold and embody, as they can help me to feel grounded and at ease within the constantly changing yet cyclical nature of life. their ability to remind me of these universal truths is protective in nature, as I am holding those truths in my palms, while being held by them in a larger sense. 

Swipe through the gallery below to see a detail of each individual pod.