i love repetition. and contrasts. severities. hundreds, one, black, white. life.death. i have been casting snakes and deer legs, blindly. not knowing what the result will be, but loving the process too much to stop. then I went to post these images, for the sake of exposing the process. i think the 1st two are telling. they work well together. going with that will be my next step.






sometimes the simplest are my favorite. i was wrapping the dead baby bird in thread. orange, gray. and simultaneously wrapped a large sculpture in hoarse hair (thanks laurel), then wrapped the bird in one strand of the hoarse hair. to me this reads nurturing, maybe even mourning of one distinct species for another, contrasting most obviously in size.

The deer is finished!
Because of the plexiglas, his shadows play on the wall, an effect I hadn't thought of as relevant until someone brought it to my attention. (I'm going to try and get a better image with the shadows).


My studio grows.

A story from my childhood, written on a chalkboard. A porcelain squirrel, relevant to the story.


Baby birds and snakes. I'm VERY happy with the shelf of many birds, not so sure about the cluster of birds in the corner, how the snake relates to them, and the dark gray behind them. Working the details out as this body of work progresses.

I seem to have forgotten how important showing the process of making the work is. I was reminded this past weekend.

The porcelain deer you saw in earlier blogs was made with a plaster cast. I took a cast of the real deer. Because it was the summer, and animals rot more quickly after death, I was not able to get what I wished for: the entire deer. But I’m taking that as a blessing in disguise. His relief seems to be just as satisfying to me.


After bisquing (firing once) him, I covered the surface with graphite. This is the deer installed directly into the wall in my studio.(You can double-click on the photo to see it bigger and in more detail)


Realizing I was approaching the same installation issues as I always seem to, I decided to install the deer into Plexiglas, then install the plexi into the wall. I have a love affair with plexi so I’m happy with the results so far. You will see the finished product SOON!

All drawings of life are done with a black background, all of death, are on a white background. These  drawings are all of death, and though this dog is fairly decomposed and may be a gruesome subject, I hope for a certain amount of beauty and serenity to come through.


A detail of the dog.


This is the same deer that was depicted in porcelain. The composition is similar to all of the other drawings. He lays in the bottom, left corner of a large (30"x22") piece of white paper.






The bird, with a bit of graphite added.

Video of Tops Spinning

I have been trying to upload this for months. The hands are studio-mates Dan and Drew. Their hands and their talking make the performance even more poetic for me.

there would be no beauty if there was no imperfection.

My roommate found a Robin that had fallen out of it's nest before even growing feathers. She called me at the studio and asked if I wanted it. Drew found a baby snake in the driveway and left it on my table. On a regular basis I receive gifts of exotic-looking bugs and animals such as these. I think these are really thoughtful gifts.

I have casted the Robin and the snake. The plaster positives are nowhere close to perfect, and I prefer them that way.

Death has taken on a whole new meaning out here. It has become less nostalgic, and more a part of the cycle of life. I was tempted to bury this deer, then realized the turkey vultures need to eat.


Casting a dead baby deer may seem unethical to some, to others-it immortalizes it. To me, I couldn't help but create a piece of porcelain that captures its elegant form.


A drawing of Roxy looking through a brightly lit doorway.


A hummingbird came in, attracted to the flickering fluorescent lights. He burned himself and died a while later. The colors on his neck were some I'd never seen on an animal, in person. They changed drastically, depending on your perspective.


After casting a deer leg, I began throwing the slab to flatten and reuse it...it began to look like an archeological dig.


A black snake sunning himself in the middle of the road. I thought the line he was creating was lovely.


Simon was our French resident. He came and left in a month. He was refreshingly goofy.


2 cows silhouettes looked like one long, many legged animal when I first came over the hill. Neither of these photos created the result I wanted, but the blurriness and bug guts on the windshield may be better.



Our second tomatoe from our garden!

So much time gone by… lots of adjusting and working.
I had no idea how intense and exhausting a wood firing can be. We did 8-17 hour shifts each. A shift includes listening, watching the kiln so you know when it needs to be “fed”, (yes, like a child). Once it hits around 18-1900 degrees, this feeding happens every 5-10 minutes. Imagine that. 8 hours solid feeding 7 pieces of wood, 4 of pine, 3 of oak every 5 minutes, but the end you are one with a 2400 degree kiln. I opted for the fireman’s jacket. Being the only girl, I have no testosterone I have to prove of.


Out of the wood firing:
Tops-Again, wanting, making hundreds of spinning tops. Want a machine that will spin them within a large room-thinking like bowling pin dropping machines, or as dad suggested a spiral machine that spits them out, then they fall into a slight spiral within the floor, and then the come back around to the machine, so as to keep spinning. Love the constant spinning, however, want the sound of hundreds. The audio seems just as important to me as the visual. Wish to put a video on here for you to see them spinning. Anyone know who can fabricate a machine for me?


A salt-fired piece covered with a “skin”, then fired again in the wood kiln. I’m liking this effect and am doing more as you read.


When I was in Italy I bruised myself on a constant basis. Hammering my thumb, while chiseling stone seemed to be my favorite. I photographed these injuries. Here, burning myself seems to take priority to bruising. On heat guns, hot oil, no kilns yet. These 4 spots (2 a little hard to see) are from hot oil. The injury to the body and healing process are fascinating to me. I think photographing the healing process daily is next. Making a flipbook to watch the skin injury, then heal, scar, and heal more?

Body jewelry, in a way. It does not sit on you, as a bracelet or a ring, but is made directly from your own form. My fingers creating a negative space that is formed with porcelain. My teeth creating their own form. I have begun taking some of the boy’s forms, like Drew’s nice little cleft chin. Jewelry, because where the body does not touch the porcelain it is decorated with porcelain “spikes”? “dots”?-what is a good word for these small blobs with sexy little additions?




Have begun taking molds not only of wild animal body parts, but also human body parts. I’m amazed by the incredible detail (notice on the knee), and have figured out a way to keep these porcelain casts super thin.


Roxy has become one of my subjects. I cannot seem to get my camera to focus on these drawings successfully, but these give you some idea. The paper is not black, but rubbed with graphite, except for the halo of the dog. The found dead dog is a subject also. However, as of now, he will stay on white paper. The composition will stay the same, a small figure at the base of the page. But unlike the atmospheric, “hopeful” black, the lifeless dog will be on a somewhat glowing, lifeless page.