Maru potters of Rajasthan

The Maru potters did not believe, as some cultures did, that deities reside in stone but rather in clay because of the nature of its elements. They believe a pot is like a person in that there is a birth and a death (the inevitable break), and that a broken pot will eventually return to nature, as people do. Likewise, they believed that a good potter perspires when he kneads wet clay which means potter and clay permeate each other and become one. The clay becomes infused with the potter, the potter takes on elements from the clay as well. In some villages the potters are also priests, taking the respect for this profession and its proximity to the life and death cycle to another level entirely.

This is not an art lesson idea as much as an invitation to rethink how clay is presented. In every clay program children are taught to pound and work the clay in a rough manner in order to prevent air bubbles which could cause items to explode in the kiln. The kneading is billed as being necessary in order to prevent something bad from happening, not as something beneficial in its own right. I think it would be a great visual for clay-workers of any age to have when conditioning their own clay--imagining that the true goal is to become 'one with the clay' through the hard work of kneading and pounding. In fact, now that I know this reason for wanting sweat to mingle with clay, it seems like a wasted opportunity if a potter's only goal is such a mechanical one.

Here he is in action, mixing lots of sand into the clay, as well as mica. The clay is fired in a outdoor kiln at about 650*F.