Remember that I am Dust
I forgot how much I like the way clay feels in my hands. In elementary school, I often used air drying Mexican clay. At first, always the deep red clay- I made a dinosaur head for a project once in forth grade, adding real grasses glued to the inside of its mouth after the clay dried. My mom had coached me on how to work the clay to get it to match the shapes I saw in the photo of the dinosaur. I kept the project for years. I may still have it in storage along with the rest of my belongings far away in Tucson.
In fifth or sixth grade, I came across this interesting clay that actually hardened IN water! After forming a tiny little teapot, complete with detachable lid, I placed the piece in a tub of water and after the subscribed time, took it out. I was pleased and fascinated by how hard the clay had become. I know for sure I still have that piece...in my storage unit along with the rest of my life.
It was before high school, but for sure by 10th grade that I decided the red clay was not my favorite. The color was harsh and I didn't like the look of it on my hands- too much like blood, I thought. Sometimes it stained my fingers. I gravitated towards grey and white clays and started making more complicated pieces.
A clay cardinal bird family with eggs and a nest made of sticks for a science project about my favorite birds.
For math class in 8th grade, a rose with removable petals like a modified Russian doll, each section displaying the properties of integers and how they were interrelated.
I made figurines based off of friends, animals or people in my imagination all through high school. My favorite was a marionette type clay figure, joined together with tiny wires I embedded into the joints of limb to make it movable. He had a jovial, laughing face and was fashioned after my dad's features.
The figurines were my favorite to make, but the air dried clay is not known for its strength and all of them broke. No matter how hard I tried to pack them with care, between the many times I had to pack them in bubble wrap or newspaper, stash them in boxes for yet another move and unpack them again...they couldn't handle the stress.
At Pima Community college in Tucson, while I was attending the University of Arizona, I took art and dance classes for my own amusement. My favorite was a ceramics class taught by a Japanese professor. In that class, I learned to throw pots, bowls etc on a wheel, how to glaze and how to build facial features for figures more realistically. The clay was soft, grey, more pliable with wet fingers, then hardened in a kiln. This clay was certainly more durable than I had ever used. I took great pleasure in watching a bowl form under my fingertips on the spinning wheel and even greater pleasure watching my family eat out of the bowls I had made with my own hands. I also made two figures, one of a friend leaping in the air to catch a frisbee, another of a friend playing the guitar. These were kiln fired and then placed in my garden in Tucson. They broke as I was shuffling my garden items around in preparation for the move back to St. Louis.
The movement of the human body has always captivated me. I love to dance and watch people dance. I like to watch the way people play with their hair or stare off into space, walk across a room, shake hands, check their watches, laugh. When I am struck by a certain pose, it freezes in my memory and I try my best to capture it in clay. I've tried drawing such memories, but they don't translate as easily. With clay in my hands, the figures are absorbed from my memory, through my fingertips and into the clay.
Sometimes, if I don't have an idea, I like to knead the clay in my hands and often the clay will become something that I didn't first intend, as if that bit of clay was meant for that particular shape.
I can sit for hours with clay in my hands, molding and smoothing, without realizing how much time has gone by, the only indication being an indignant full bladder which I have ignored for too long, stiff shoulders or tired fingers. While I know I have improved in technique over the years, still, I have a long way to go. I am my harshest critic. My favorite things to see in an art museum are the statues and busts done by the great artists, so I know my vast limitations.
After almost two years of not making a thing, I am experimenting with a new clay. Polymer clay (Super Sculpey) is unlike anything I have tried. Most similar in texture to the water hardened clay of years past, it is dense until warmed with my body heat after kneading. It is the color of my flesh, and oddly, leaves no visible residue on my hands. Once formed, it is almost rubbery, and after placing in the over for 15 minutes, becomes strong and hard. The clay is easy to form and I have been surprised and pleased by the results so far. It is so mess free that I brought the clay to work and all day at my desk formed a dancing woman in a dress. I will be painting the pieces with acrylic paint. I will be using this clay more often now, but if I had access to a kiln, I would use the wonderful heavy wet firing clay as well because I love the cool, smooth, wetness of it. Polymer clay is dainty. Kiln appropriate clay is more fun to manhandle.
My mom said that working with clay is therapeutic. I agree. For such a tactile, touch-oriented person such as myself, clay is the ultimate medium and I am relieved to have my hands in it again. (Pun intended) I want to say that working with clay makes me feel like I am able to make sense of life in a small way, to literally and figuratively grasp the uncertainties of my life with less discontent, but maybe that is cheesy.
To be honest, I felt strange as I worked with the new clay, like I was accessing some part of myself I had forgotten was missing. This type of moment has occurred frequently since moving back to St. Louis. Time completely slipped away, unencumbered by any thoughts in particular. I just worked and worked, focusing all my energy into the features of my piece, making the clay match the image in my mind. I felt tired, but the happy, productive kind of tired when I was finished. Throughout the process, I imagined God molding Adam and Eve, and me, out of the clay of the earth, adding the cheek bones here, building the hips fuller here...the image in His mind forming under his fingertips, fired to hardness under the heat of his breath...just as prone to breaking as any clay figurine.
In fifth or sixth grade, I came across this interesting clay that actually hardened IN water! After forming a tiny little teapot, complete with detachable lid, I placed the piece in a tub of water and after the subscribed time, took it out. I was pleased and fascinated by how hard the clay had become. I know for sure I still have that piece...in my storage unit along with the rest of my life.
It was before high school, but for sure by 10th grade that I decided the red clay was not my favorite. The color was harsh and I didn't like the look of it on my hands- too much like blood, I thought. Sometimes it stained my fingers. I gravitated towards grey and white clays and started making more complicated pieces.
A clay cardinal bird family with eggs and a nest made of sticks for a science project about my favorite birds.
For math class in 8th grade, a rose with removable petals like a modified Russian doll, each section displaying the properties of integers and how they were interrelated.
I made figurines based off of friends, animals or people in my imagination all through high school. My favorite was a marionette type clay figure, joined together with tiny wires I embedded into the joints of limb to make it movable. He had a jovial, laughing face and was fashioned after my dad's features.
The figurines were my favorite to make, but the air dried clay is not known for its strength and all of them broke. No matter how hard I tried to pack them with care, between the many times I had to pack them in bubble wrap or newspaper, stash them in boxes for yet another move and unpack them again...they couldn't handle the stress.
At Pima Community college in Tucson, while I was attending the University of Arizona, I took art and dance classes for my own amusement. My favorite was a ceramics class taught by a Japanese professor. In that class, I learned to throw pots, bowls etc on a wheel, how to glaze and how to build facial features for figures more realistically. The clay was soft, grey, more pliable with wet fingers, then hardened in a kiln. This clay was certainly more durable than I had ever used. I took great pleasure in watching a bowl form under my fingertips on the spinning wheel and even greater pleasure watching my family eat out of the bowls I had made with my own hands. I also made two figures, one of a friend leaping in the air to catch a frisbee, another of a friend playing the guitar. These were kiln fired and then placed in my garden in Tucson. They broke as I was shuffling my garden items around in preparation for the move back to St. Louis.
The movement of the human body has always captivated me. I love to dance and watch people dance. I like to watch the way people play with their hair or stare off into space, walk across a room, shake hands, check their watches, laugh. When I am struck by a certain pose, it freezes in my memory and I try my best to capture it in clay. I've tried drawing such memories, but they don't translate as easily. With clay in my hands, the figures are absorbed from my memory, through my fingertips and into the clay.
Sometimes, if I don't have an idea, I like to knead the clay in my hands and often the clay will become something that I didn't first intend, as if that bit of clay was meant for that particular shape.
I can sit for hours with clay in my hands, molding and smoothing, without realizing how much time has gone by, the only indication being an indignant full bladder which I have ignored for too long, stiff shoulders or tired fingers. While I know I have improved in technique over the years, still, I have a long way to go. I am my harshest critic. My favorite things to see in an art museum are the statues and busts done by the great artists, so I know my vast limitations.
After almost two years of not making a thing, I am experimenting with a new clay. Polymer clay (Super Sculpey) is unlike anything I have tried. Most similar in texture to the water hardened clay of years past, it is dense until warmed with my body heat after kneading. It is the color of my flesh, and oddly, leaves no visible residue on my hands. Once formed, it is almost rubbery, and after placing in the over for 15 minutes, becomes strong and hard. The clay is easy to form and I have been surprised and pleased by the results so far. It is so mess free that I brought the clay to work and all day at my desk formed a dancing woman in a dress. I will be painting the pieces with acrylic paint. I will be using this clay more often now, but if I had access to a kiln, I would use the wonderful heavy wet firing clay as well because I love the cool, smooth, wetness of it. Polymer clay is dainty. Kiln appropriate clay is more fun to manhandle.
My mom said that working with clay is therapeutic. I agree. For such a tactile, touch-oriented person such as myself, clay is the ultimate medium and I am relieved to have my hands in it again. (Pun intended) I want to say that working with clay makes me feel like I am able to make sense of life in a small way, to literally and figuratively grasp the uncertainties of my life with less discontent, but maybe that is cheesy.
To be honest, I felt strange as I worked with the new clay, like I was accessing some part of myself I had forgotten was missing. This type of moment has occurred frequently since moving back to St. Louis. Time completely slipped away, unencumbered by any thoughts in particular. I just worked and worked, focusing all my energy into the features of my piece, making the clay match the image in my mind. I felt tired, but the happy, productive kind of tired when I was finished. Throughout the process, I imagined God molding Adam and Eve, and me, out of the clay of the earth, adding the cheek bones here, building the hips fuller here...the image in His mind forming under his fingertips, fired to hardness under the heat of his breath...just as prone to breaking as any clay figurine.
Comments
When I am struck by a certain pose, it freezes in my memory and I try my best to capture it in clay. I've tried drawing such memories, but they don't translate as easily. With clay in my hands, the figures are absorbed from my memory, through my fingertips and into the clay.
This is spoken from the heart of a true artist. Beautiful!