Hello,

My name is Brenda Munoz and I am a Senior at North Monterey County High school. Sophomore year of high school, I signed up for a ceramics course. During winter break of sophomore year, I visited my parents’ homeland– Jalisco.

I remember seeing streets full of ceramic sellers. Viewing everything sparked me with inspiration; I wanted to create similar traditional pieces myself. I began practicing my throwing skills and learned from lots of unsuccessful pieces. I constantly wanted to try to throw larger and attempt different styles of Mexican Ceramic pieces.

I create functional wheel thrown pieces using two different bodies of clay; Bee Mix and Red Clay. I like to incorporate my abilities of both wheel throwing and hand building techniques onto my pieces. As I have developed and evolved as a ceramic artist, I have found a personal theme of cactus.

Both of my parents are from a small town in Jalisco. My Father is from a ranch called “La Nopalera’’ and my mother is from a ranch called “Jesus Maria”. People from Jesus Maria are known as the ”olleros” (the potters) and La Nopalera translates to (Fields of Cactuses). Unfortunately those small towns have been forgotten and most of the population has moved out. In this piece “Nunca Te Olvidare”(I will never forget you), I express my never ending love for those beautiful towns.

For this piece, I threw the authentic vessel and carefully attached cactuses around the vessel for texture. I stained the cactus with a light green underglaze, and glazed the cactus pears with bright red and yellow underglazes. Finally, I applied a clear coat, inside of the vessel, around the lip and on the cactuses, highlighting their natural state.