Response to Video

I was researching Native American Pottery and Totems to teach as a lesson to a group of 6th and 7th graders. I stumbled upon this video and was taken aback by the amount of things that we take for granted or forget. Opening a bag in the studio, I often forget that the contents of the bag are part of the earth. It was absolutely incredible to watch Tony Soares dig up earth and create clay. A reason that I love working with clay is because the methods that we still use today date back thousands of years. The process connects us to the past and people around the world.Clay can connect you to different areas of the world and different values. This is such a time consuming practice, that Tony has mastered. In our class, we worked using molds; however, Tony was using a sunken area of sand. He has simply mastered the technique that people used so many years ago. It is amazing to see him use similar tools to us, such as the paddle. There is something so eerie and spiritual in watching a pot be created in this way.  It is amazing that the process of working with clay does not change much over time. We also used a mold for our first project. We used the coil method as he did. We also smoothed the lines and used the paddle to work with the clay. Our projects look just like miniature versions of his. It is so interesting to connect the work that we do in our class to practices thousands of years old around the world.