Coming Home to Clay
Margaret Parker's clay sculptures give shelter to spirit in a turbulent world
Three years ago Margaret Parker, our Polk County friend from Sam’s campaign days, decided to create balance in her life. She didn’t take chances with COVID, and she didn’t stop working for candidates with views like hers, but neither did she want to sit still absorbing the daily barrage of disturbing news.
She has always loved art, so she signed up for a class in figurative ceramic clay sculpting at Odyssey Clay Works in Asheville. Her Janus figure below was made in class. To me, the lion is protecting the child. To the artist or to you it might mean something else.
Margaret says,
The child was modeled from a photo of me when I was two years old and I used internet photos for constructing the lion. I began with a big chunk of redrock stoneware clay from Highwater Clays in Asheville and used tools and my hands to remove [clay] and shape the piece. I was shocked at what happened and was hooked! After the piece was fired in a kiln, the challenge of painting it opened up another aspect of art learning. So I took a beginning art class to learn about color theory.
Here’s another of her early pieces.
Margaret’s work shows me it doesn’t matter if you’re a beginner. If you have something to say, and you work at the piece until you feel at one with it, it will speak for you.
I asked her if she’s ever started with one idea and wound up with something completely different.
[Once I began a] man in a tree I named Ariel, From Shakespeare’s The Tempest. It started out as a bust of my nephew. I got frustrated with how it was going, so I just gave up and started pulling clay out of the top of his head. It then took off in a very different direction that I liked. I learned that letting go can be very good!
Below is “Liberty, Justice and Equality”, after the French Revolution motto. Margaret added masks at the height of the pandemic, removed them in June, then put them back when the Delta variant flared.
About her recent work Margaret says,
Today I am experimenting with making sculptures from fiber clay and I like how strong and moldable it is. I am also rolling out slabs of clay to shape rather than using chunks to carve.
“Bird Sconce” is her interpretation of an art deco piece by French sculptor Albert Cheuret. Her current project “Hands” is a commentary on child labor in textile mills in the early 1900’s.
To me, a healthy life is where there is a balance of work and play with your spirit engaged in each. I know that Margaret’s commitment to working for candidates she believes in is just as strong as her passion for creating in clay. She says,
Clay sculpting has given me a lot of comfort during the pandemic. I am beginning to look at the world through different eyes and I have had to learn that it is okay to be a novice and to not do things perfectly. All great lessons for a recovering politico!