LINES OF COLOUR
Creative Meanderings – calling up new stories of lineage
Clays and oxides go through a transformation within the intense heat of a kiln. Clay reacts in different ways with various oxides, add to the dance a change in heat settings and results differ yet again.
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Each varied transformation opens my imagination to a new her-story, a new lineage. New voices arise from unique skin tones, skin textures, lights and shadows, how they feel when held in the palm of my hand. I ask each one “Dear One, what is your story? where have you come from? what wisdom would you like to share?” It is from this creative space that new stories are heard …
Driving Creek Local Clay...
Clay: Local Coromandel terracotta & grog (crushed ceramics)
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Firing temp: 1140 degrees
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Oxide: Crocus Martis
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Fired result and the voice of Alchemy:
Glowing red timbre, deepened in the shadows with rich darkness. Bursts of light play over the surface, a gritty rawness ‘magicked’ with sparkle. Tiny fissures open to the fire within.
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A woman’s voice:
I am a creative mix of lights and shadows, of raw grit from the earth, a harvesting of all women.
My skin is marked and scarred from my journey of making, loving and loss, of exquisite beauty and a life hard worn.
I glow with a radiant internal fire that overcomes life’s challenges.
I offer a deep bow to the millions of hand-formed pottery and sculptures created by the many hands of women before me.
I am a symbol of life’s hardships, transformed through fire into beauty.
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Voice of lineage:
A lineage of artisans, of women pregnant with new possibilities and earth worn hands.
We work with the earth, sun-baked soil full of substance, containing the artifacts of all the clay-works that have been formed and then buried for centuries.
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Red Raku (Dark)
Clay: Feeneys Red Raku
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Firing temp: 1140 degrees
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Oxide: Manganese Dioxide
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Fired result and the voice of Alchemy:
I have rough, gritty, matt surfaces that absorb and reflect light, shadows that glisten, reflection in dark places, mystery in the deep colour of night … and beneath, elusively visible, pulses a deep rich red light, the molten heat of life within
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A woman’s voice:
I am a woman of the first tribe, my body is full of childbearing.
I am a woman of substance.
I am courage and wisdom of the ancients.
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Voice of lineage:
Women of wide hip and girth, our lineage is of the abundant gatherer, harvesters of love and magick.
We give birth to the mysteries of womanhood, our hips are full for children to rest upon, our breasts provide sustenance for future generations and our arms span wide to gather in the young ones, rocking them close to the beat of our hearts.
We are gatherers of souls who have lost their way, our bodies resting places for those in need of life sustenance and love.
Red Raku
Clay: Feeneys Red Raku
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Firing temp: 1140 degrees
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Oxide: Crocus Martis
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Fired result and the voice of Alchemy:
the original mix of deep rich red clay and a deeper darker rich red brown in the shadows. An ancient stone mix that feels like it’s been unearthed after centuries underground. A beautiful mix of textures and earth colours, the original voice emerging from the depths of fire, glowing with heat, colour, and vitality.
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A woman’s voice:
Soul traveller, I am here to do soul work. I carry the library of women’s DNA within me, I carry the task of liberating stories passed down through the ages, stories of life as women.
I am formed from the earth into which all women’s bodies have returned,
I am speckled with light, and I reflect the dark shadows within our stories, the deep rich mysterious nature of women.
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Voice of lineage:
We span through time, spinning threads of living experiences to be woven into the fabric of humanity.
We are storage keepers, life bringers, we are of the original mother, the first, the one who gave birth to all.
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Red Stoneware
Clay: Red Stoneware w/grog
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Firing temp: 1140 degrees
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Oxide: Crocus Martis
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Fired result and the voice of Alchemy:
these colours work magic with each other, a natural movement of deep red earth browns, and the deeper oxide pigment offers a rich contrast.
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A woman’s voice:
I am born from the mothers who tend the sacred spaces of women.
My task is to tend the deep wells of inner sight and wisdom.
I am the sacred space holder of deep underground grottos where women go for renewal and sustenance.
I am a healer of the flesh and body.
I tend to the moments of transition from the upper and lower worlds.
I am the pulse of life within the taproots that reach both up and down though the gateway of life and death.
I am the sacred image holder of all women in their natural state and form.
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Voice of lineage:
The sacred task of this bloodline is to support balance and entry between a woman’s life above ground and below.
We maintain sacred wells and deep underground caverns so that all women can find respite, renewal, and resurgence of vital lifegiving sustenance.
Our task is to help women find, and hold strong, their connection between ground and Grace.
Our wombs are this meeting place of ground and grace, the dark cavern where the wholeness of women is formed, fed, nurtured into being.
We tend to the taproots that reach down into the rich fecund soil of the Mother, the ancients, taproots that also extend up into the world above where we touch spaciousness of time and timelessness, we are charged with keeping these channels open so that sustenance flows freely in both directions, feeding both psyche and body. ​.
Speckled Stoneware
Clay: Primo Pro Stoneware Speckled
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Firing temp: 1190 degrees
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Oxide: Manganese Dioxide, Crocus Martis or Iron Oxide Purple
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Fired result and the voice of Alchemy:
Dark rivulets of black oxide streaming down, glistening surfaces with pools and shimmers of light, born from the dance of light and shadow
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A woman’s voice:
I am a woman of light and shadow, I represent the fluid nature of women, our shapeshifting essence as life flows around and through us.
'I represent the dual nature of a woman, the glimpses of light within the dark, the polarity of the dark being visible within the light.
I am a symbol of the impermanence of life.
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Voice of lineage:
The blood of our lineage is the Women of Shapeshifters. We hold space for the impermanence of life and the constant shifts, changes, and adaptions of ourselves as women through 2.5 million years of being human. Our blood is born from the shifting sands of time and form. As women we are constantly changing and adapting.
Holding the torch and lighting the way in both daylight and darkness.
We contain both and all.
As individual humans we are but a link in the evolutionary chain yet are as important as the mothers of every single generation preceding us.
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Sculptural Stoneware
Clay: Primo Pro Sculptural Stoneware
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Firing temp: 1190 degrees
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Oxide: Crocus Martis or Iron Oxide Purple
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Fired result and the voice of Alchemy:
Rich ochres, pale skins, I am born from the bones of the mother herself, from deep within the core of the earth itself
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A woman’s voice:
I am of the earth, of the underground, where bones meet and rest, where flesh returns to the soil, back to the greater ecology.
I am the wisdom keeper of bones.
I tend to the deepest structure of being human, our skeleton, our marrow, the core of ourselves where our newest cells are formed within the oldest part of our human body.
As a woman I symbolise the life death life cycle.
I symbolise patience and resurgence. I am the healer of flesh, bones, and body.
Unafraid of dark places, I come from the core structure of life, where the alchemy of life is formed.
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Voice of lineage:
We are a sacred line of bone keepers. Keepers of the knowledge that is formed in the depths of our human bones. We are healers of the ecology of the human body and the body of this planet. We are the ones who live deep in the forests, we know how to live with nature because we are from nature. From our wombs come regeneration and growth. We tend to the greater cycles of life.
Black Stoneware
Clay: Primo Pro Nigra 2002 black stoneware
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Firing temp: 1190 degrees
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Oxide: Manganese Dioxide, Crocus Martis or Iron Oxide Purple
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Fired result and the voice of Alchemy:
Fired within the very depths of the kiln, exquisite alchemy turns greys into intense blacks.
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A woman’s voice:
I am from the hottest and most ancient parts of Africa, the crucible of humankind.
As a woman I represent the turning point moment that set us on our own personal journey.
I represent the oldest part of us that links back to the time before we began, to the unknown and yet to be formed state.
I represent the veils between the seen and unseen, the membrane between our lived experience and all other.
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Voice of lineage:
We are the lineage that was formed in the hottest parts of Africa. We are born from the membrane that exists between night and day. We are the space between the seen and unseen, known and unknown.
