Historical inspired Coil Pot

Artist Statement:

For this assignment, we were instructed to find a ceramic sculpture or pot that was at lead 5,000 years old. A few weeks prior I want to the MFA in Boston, Mass. and was fortunate to see many incredible pieces in person. While I was there I took many pictures to get inspiration for my historically inspired coil pot. When it cam time to make a decision I landed on this pot originating from Northwest Iran. Historians believe it was some kind of infant feeding vessel. I really likes how these pieces include elements of life. Birds represent adaptation, fertility, and good health in many cultures. The face is also that of a woman also representing life. These elements combined with the function of the piece, I believe, symbolize the prosperity of life and humanity, which is what initially drew me to the piece. Going into this piece I wanted to keep the face, but I changed the animal to a mix between a Mandrill and a Baboon because the spout looked more like a monkey tail than a birds.

The materials I used for this piece was clay, the coil machine to help make better, consistent coild, a scratch tool, and a glazes: PC-4, PC-36, and SM-51. I started this piece on a flat slab and stacked and manipulated the coils into the shape I wanted. Beforehand I used a piece of cardstock to cut out half of the shape of the piece to create a rough stencil that I could use to help guid my ceramic sculpture into the right shape. I then built the neck and tail separately and attached them at the end. To finish I glazed the pot with a read face, representative of a Mandrill, and a red bum, representative of a Baboon.

Overall, I am happy with this piece and I think my coil technique improved quite a bit from the previous project. One regret I have about this piece was that I couldn't include the little feet which the original pieces have, I thought they were really cool but I didn't think that they would effectively work. As soon as the piece turned bone dry, they probably would not have supported the weight of the body. But I still like this piece and I use it to water my plants, and like the original piece, my Beans represents prosperity and life of my dear plants.