Back to Sculpture mother and child…
It all began as a form of therapy. My own therapy, I enrolled in a ceramics open studio class in order to give myself a creative outlet. I felt the need for some creative time to myself. Yet there I was creating an image of a mother and child, one of the most common images created since the beginning of time. The Madonna, for example baby Jesus and his earthly mother Mary an imagine that had for centuries been in many churches around Europe and the world. Yet there I was creating a raw imagine and honest image of something I missed. My children breast feeding, the simple joy of having them need me and the permanence of that imagery in ceramics gave me comfort.
Ceramics once fired can obviously be shattered cracked and destroyed but as a medium can not be altered once fired in and taken out of the kiln oven. It’s not like a painting where you can wait paint over it and change the image. You have to make concrete decisions and let it be once the image is dry. Even more so after being fired, it’s done finished set in stone. The first one I created cracked in the kiln. I knew what I had done wrong the sculpture was put together in two general pieces and I had waited too long to connect them. Slipping and scoring at the exact right time is a beautiful technique but I got hung up on the detail work of the mother’s hair and the head dried too much before I connected the two pieces together. See if you do this the clay doesn’t bond properly and can dry and separate in the firing process.
The second time after configuring my piece and sculpting it a second time I was ready with the perfect timing of when to mold the two parts together and after the first kiln firing they were perfectly joined. The lips on the baby on the breast of the mother. The mothers head perfectly resting on her own arm. I reinforced the bottom of the babies body with the bottom of the mothers as well in order to make the sculpture more sturdy as a wall hanging.
This was one of my sculpted clay pieces after being gone from sculpture for almost 16 months and wow did I miss it. I was so happy with the results and I realized how therapeutic the building process, planing process and everything down to the feeling of the cold clay in my hand was for me. Have you ever done something or been so lost in a project that you loose track on time, the world and your worries the small or large problems you have seem to fade because your so involved and invested in what your currently doing? That was this for me. The memories invoked by the imagery of the breastfeeding baby and expressive mothers face was wonderful, what a gift.
Second piece first firing
