Eye of the Storm

From the series: An Inventory of Tools for Coping.

Coping Tools and Other Artifacts - Statement

Coping Tools and Other Artifacts is a series of ceramics about crisis and recovery. Mental and emotional health have played an important role in my creative practice, especially in the last few years. Observing and participating in my son’s journey through autism has brought invaluable lessons, unexpected difficulties, celebration, sadness, and ultimately; discovery. Working with clay is a metaphor for the malleability of the brain and its great capacity for transformation.

These ceramics start with a general idea of what I want. Some of them represent identifiable objects, while others are abstract and suggestive of organic shapes found in nature, but all of them are somehow connected to the subject of coping. It is mostly through the titles what I reveal some aspects of the specific idea that I’m exploring. In terms of fabrication, I use slabs that I create by pressing pieces of clay on a table surface with a wooden rolling pin. I then cut out different shapes with a potter’s knife to combine and create these objects. What follows is the application of colored underglaze with a brush, followed by a period where I let the pieces dry until they’re ready for bisque firing. Once the piece is in the bisque state, I sometimes draw on the surface with underglaze pencils. The last step consists of applying glossy or satin glaze on the surface and proceeding with the final firing.

• Materials: Ceramic
• Size: 25 x 3.75 x 3.75 cm
• Year: 2023
• Inventory #: 23-16
• Artist: Elsa Mora Tamayo