Here are two more blobby little kiln goddesses from the armless posse, one based on the stiff white [death] goddess and one sort of Venus of Willendorfish. This second one actually has two slashes across the tops of the breasts for arms, but no legs and no features on the face or even a real face.
These bottom two are voudou pacquets, power figures based on African and Haitian ones that are in the Brooklyn Museum as well as the Met. I made them along with a few others a few years ago and keep these two and one other in a ceramic boat that I also made. I love these figures. I had never made anything like them before, although I was born on a tiny street near the banks of Bayou St. John in New Orleans and grew up a few blocks away, also near the bayou. That bayou was a place where voudou rites were held, and it was also an escape route for slaves in earlier days. My own French Catholic grandmother sprinkled holy water every night while facing north, south, east, and west so that all family members were protected no matter which direction they lived in. I can remember being splashed with water when I spent the night with her while my grandfather was away on a business trip. I had no idea what she was doing, but she walked over to a window and said prayers and sprinkled holy water while I peeked out from under the covers. Then she paraded to other windows to do the other directions. She kept her holy water on an alter in the bedroom. I think she would have liked these pacquets. They're filled with stones, bones, other materials.
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