Made in Burnesville, NC

I have lived in arid climates for long periods during different times of my life. While there I felt "dried out'" and "thirsty" but once I've gone, I notice how much I miss the wide palette of earth colors that can only be seen in places where plants don't cover them. I rarely add anything to the raw earth color of the clay I work with.

As a child I lived with my family in the Mojave Desert in California for 5 years. There were no boundaries so I ran free from morning to night, dressed only in shorts. The soles of my feet were tough and I could run across the hardened clay spaces, exhilarated by the feeling of my feet as they touched the earth. I grew strong, fast and agile..sinewy, like some little desert animal. The gift I received was of complete freedom..freedom to go as far as I wanted, in whichever direction I wanted only limited by my own wish to change directions.
I became a proud, skilled hunter of horny toads and lizards and knew where the snakes, spiders and other dangerous creatures hid out.

Once my father took us to see a trickle of water which fell inside a cave formed by some big rocks piled against each other. It was called "Great Fallls" and for me it was definitely great. It was the first time I could remember having seen water that didn't come out of a pipe..and the pipe that brought us water was on top of the ground coming from somewhere far away across the desert.

We moved to the Midwest. There were trees all over, very green ones, grass, a myriad of plants..and water...so much water..right on top of the ground. There was a pond, a river, some streams, rain and snow. My outlook on life changed completely. Green felt so luxurious, and hid so many secrets.

Frogs, garter snakes, lightning bugs, ferns, lichens and every other kind of novel living being took the place of the horny toads and lizards. For the first time I was aware of how much my physical surroundings make me the person I am at any given moment. I couldn't run free as before, the spaces were broken up by houses, roads, forests..the river. It became necessary to learn new skills, walking over the leaves in silence, sneaking under low hanging branches, climbing high into the trees...it was a different world.

Since then I have seen my work change drastically, according to where I am and which manifestation of nature I find myself in. After living my whole adult life in arid Mediterranean landscapes, I spent 5 months traveling around the USA in 2012. Even though I still prefer to let the earth colors show through in all their splendor, the forms have taken on the delicate, fragile feel of the wild mushrooms and forest mosses.

These were made in the Blue Ridge Mountains, North Carolina. The only place I myself chose as home while still living in the US was North Carolina. I had lived in many places throughout my childhood wherever my father's job and wanderlust took us..but I chose NC. It was love at first sight and she has always been my dream lover. Spending a month there this summer was a dream come true.

In my twenties, my parents paid for me to do the first Concentration course offered at Penland School of Crafts. A life changing experience. My teachers, my mentors were Cynthia Bringle and Paulus Behrenson. Choosing to live my adult life in Spain put being an art/crafts person out of the question because that can only happen in an affluent society, which Spain wasn't. Even so, I have since then used the training they gave me in clay to express my emotions and sensuality. Clay is the most sensual of all materials I have used. The two completely different perspectives of each of my teachers has made a life long impression.

I relive those impressions, feelings, thoughts and excitement every time I get a chance to use a potter's wheel and every time I use a wooden kitchen utensil to guide the shape of the clay. I remember words they said and ideas they gave. The smooth, contemplative, dancing way Paulus's hands loved the clay...the firm guidance Cynthia gave it to make it into exactly the form she had decided previously. These little table sculptures are the words I wrote while all those memories came to me in NC in September, 2012. They are clay colored, altered, wheel thrown table sculptures with lichen/mushroom/moss stuck to their fragile,luscious, overgrown, softly hanging lip. They are the pieces I was pushed to make by the landscape that surrounded me.

I love the variety in clay colors. I have lived much of my adult life in Andalucía in the southern part of Spain. It is an arid place where the colors of the earth are readily visible. It is fascinating to see how many shades of "ëarth color"  there are and how quickly they change from one place to another.