2000.2 - MOLA MOLA

My next fish was the mola mola, or sunfish. One reason I like these is that they have a layer of blubber, my favorite material since I did my thesis on it. It differs from whale blubber in that it doesn’t have the strong, helically arranged structural collagen fibers that whale blubber has, but I still think it is pretty neat. I also liked it because I was able to make it by putting two large, flat bowls together to make the main structure. It doesn’t look exactly like the real fish, but I like the geometric aspect of it. As sculptor, Jonathan Kingdom says, “This is art, not taxidermy.” The glaze on this fish is raku, and it was a real picnic taking the fish out of the hot oxidation kiln and getting it, intact, into the combustibles for the reduction. I didn’t even crack the piece, like I did with all of my other large raku pieces.