"Shaman in the Snow"

"A hunter-shaman, while walking in the snow,
 Came across two women, whom he liked but did not know.
 The erotic gals were naked, but weren't shivering cold,
 'They may be curanderas, why else would they be so bold?' "

Most of my content laden work is about mendicants, Buddhists, lovers, spiritual interactions with the physical plane, and often seems to be loaded with sexual innuendo. Sex, and provocation, are the impetus for the soul to improve itself. Insofar as human desire can be channelled, enlightenment can sometimes follow. This is the essence of tantra.

Sometimes my drawings don't have much of a drama going on. This is the state of aimless flux in which we live the daily moments of our lives. Then something happens, and it becomes a bit of a story. So it is with these drawings.

What would you do if you found two frozen women in the snow? You'd take them home, throw blankets around them, administer hot tea and brandy and warm them up of course!

But what if the women, or men for that matter, weren't even shivering, or acting cold? You might be suspicious, or even nervous! If you were a Shaman, a brujo, or person of spirit, you'd recognize these were like-minded persons, possessed with extra powers. You'd care for them just the same, but with a certain wariness.

"The Shaman's Love Box"

"Wearing headdresses, of fur and feather,
 Some Shamans and Brahmans got together.
 They met two sorceresses from another tribe,
 And tried to forget their Shamanic vibe."


This is another one of my crazy figure drawing boxes.

Why do I put these hats that look like sandwiches on people's heads? I'm not sure. All I know is that I like drawing hats, and the hats that really impress me are the really big ones, the elaborate ones.

Shamanic hats from around the world are unique in shape and design. Traditional native American and Siberian shaman's dress in colorful finery of furs, and feathers, and beadwork. Such costumes speak of a connection with a psychic and mythological world, a connection with forces beyond the daily realm of experience.

The Shaman lives on the periphery of society. He or she is generally not included in most group activities. He is tolerated, paid for, kept up by a kind of group will as a sort of insurance practice for bad times. For when were Shamans consulted? When all was well, when crops were good, when the tribe was at peace? Not on your life. During such times the Shaman would be laughed at, and barely thrown a bone to nibble on. But as soon as some reckoning with the underworld needed to be made, some dialogue with primal forces of nature, or a debt settled with ancestors, or ghosts, or demonic creatures, then the Shaman was in huge demand. It was in such times that he or she was paraded out in the open in all his or her finery for all the tribe to see.

Naturally the Shamanic caste and Brahmanic castes have something in common. They are conveyors of cultural liturgy, of knowledge, of the power to heal, to worship to conduct rituals, marriages, death rites etcetera.

Shamans are people too . . . they marry . . . they suffer all the usual temptations  . . infidelity greed lust, the coveting of power etcetera. However their profession places their work in a kind of sacred trust, which they must never betray. This is why Shamans, when they are not Shamans, are in a kind of ecstasy. The weight of the world has come off their shoulders.

Hence Shamans and Brahmans are, and were similar . . . and always will be.

"The Shaman, Cook and Clown"

"A Shaman a Cook and a Clown

  Looked for women in a faraway town.

  Lacking the knack they took none to the sack,

  And went home after getting turned down."

Another recent box. This one's a straight white Shino, with light reduction started at Cone 09 or thereabouts. 

I've been practicing a kind of automatic drawing. I don't think at all about where I'm moving my hand, at least not once I get going. I only try to think generally about what I'm drawing, and try to keep those thoughts as general as possible. So I'll imagine characters and hats, and types of uniform, or types of women's figures, or men, or types of postures. Or I'll imagine situations. If I can get my head distracted enough by these upper level thoughts, then my hands will take care of the drawing. It's hard and it ruins a lot of what I do! But sometimes they turn out, and I'm always overjoyed to see the way in which my story hangs together.

This box is called "The Shaman, the Cook, and the Clown" after an idea I had for a film about three male characters who live on the fringes of society, and journey forth into the big city.

The box form gives me the most density of drawing surfaces that I can pack into my kiln. A box of this design has in theory 11 surfaces that can be glazed and drawn upon. Of course with each drawing that is added so does the chance of a goof in posture, or too much oxide loaded onto the brush. The loss rate is huge due to oxide runs, stuck lids, bad drawings, glaze faults, etc. etc. but I'm slowly winning over these problems.