Exploring Growth, Integration, & Play Working in Clay: Finding Pathways to Healing and Hope
In my studio I focus my visual research on themes of growth, integration, and play on a formal, practical, and personal level. I create the forms by hand or on the potter’s wheel. After constructing the forms I employ various methods of opening and staking them into sculptural forms. I often go a step further to deconstruct and integrate sculptures or repair them in response to how they break.
On a practical level, I enjoy processing ceramic materials to create desired properties and workability in my clay. I connect with the formation and transformation of ceramic-objects and am inspired by imperfections, failures, and mistakes during or after their creation. I find ways to honor imperfections, incorporate failures, and use the disruption of mistakes as an opportunity to play with new configurations.
On a personal level, what draws me most to work in clay is that it helps me cope with my imperfect reality outside the studio. The smell of clay grounds me and something in my psyche is satisfied by the immediate response and tactile qualities. The autonomy and safety I feel in my studio provides a therapeutic space to work through anxiety free of consequence or fear of judgement. I can slow down and reflect on recent events or interactions in my life. The repetitive motions of forming, opening, and integrating remind me to remain open in my judgements-and responsive to alternate possibilities. Working through accidents in the creation process help me confront my disappointments and failures and urge me to become more flexible in my thinking.
Through the processes and experiences inside the studio—with an intrapersonal orientation—I intend to find pathways towards healing and hope for interpersonal connection and community outside the studio.