Powermask
I love polymer clay... it's like painting in three dimensions. It starts out as soft and malleable color bricks that can be shaped and blended with ease. 12 minutes at 275 degrees in the oven and they fuse to form a solid work.

This is one three polymer clay works exploring the matrix of the "mask", that fascination we all seem to have with putting on a different face. You simply can't put on a mask with feeling a glimmer of the power the ancient shamans knew... in donning the mask of a god, you become that god. Putting on a mask is a playful and mischievous act; we're hidden and can't be seen but we can see and act freely. The world around us sees only the mask and reacts according to it's power and their perception of it.

Whether you're talking about literal or figurative masks, the act of wearing one can be a two-edged sword. Used as a tool of discovery, it is very empowering to wrap ourselves in a different being and explore the nature of that new form (part of the wonder of acting is entwined with this concept). As a tool of deception, we can build a whole life around something we are not, an act of denial that can lead to great frustration and unhappiness.

Like all magics, the tool is only the focus... it is the wielder who defines the power.