Therapeutics Of Clay

It wasn't until I was burned out, dizzy for three months and at the end of a grueling schedule that I finally said screw it I am am going to take ceramics classes here on the Mendocino coast. I need to get grounded and slow down, do something I've always wanted to and heal my short circuited brain. Once I started working with clay, I became obsessed. It happens that way for some people. We are called Clayheads. Some endorphin response happens when shaping lumps of earth into works of art, discoveries are made and thousands of years of genetic memory get switched on. The thread of global ancestry is illuminated, from the first artworks known, it continues to weave its way through our fingers, transformed into clay becoming new form from the inner and the ancient. 
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Then there's the deliciousness of transformation: soft moulded clay slumped, smoothed, squished into formations, which are then dried and fired into a hardened "bisqued" version. In this piece "Turkey Tail Man", I started out knowing one thing: I want to loosely shape a face. Once the personality came through and revealed a male, it was evident that he required turkey tail mushrooms to become his true self. In the above picture and video below you can see a stain I am using to bring out the details of the sculpture now it has been fired.

The piece will be fired again and the stain will be alchemized into the clay transforming the look into a finish. Carved within the face is an archetypal script I call sacred circuitry which is found in most of my ceramic work.