Reznet

Solitary Potter

By Gemma Givens

 

Roger "Sosakete" Perkins is Akwesasne Mohawk, a Canadian tribe on the border of Ontario, Quebec, and New York. He is a cultural educator and practitioner of Mohawk culture — and the only traditional Mohawk potter in the world.

Perkins describes the process of making a pot as "healing, grounding and relaxing."

"This was a part of our history, an important necessary part that I felt love and respect for because it's a clay pot and clay comes from the earth, and the earth is our mother so the pots carry on the female energy," Perkins said at the Gathering Tribes gallery in Berkeley, Calif.

Traditional Mohawk pottery-making died out in the 1600s because of trade with metal pots and tools that took over traditional skills, he said.

Perkins' mentor, Jan Swart, shared objects, broken pieces of pots, knowledge and history with him. Then a traditional Hopi person taught him how to dig and find clay, how to make basic pinch pots and coil pots, process the clay, clean it and add different tempers, and how to fire it with wood. Perkins is now a master at the firing process. He uses commercial clay, dug clay, and clay from the Pueblo of Jemez in New Mexico.

Gemma Givens, Guatemala Mayan, is a freshman at the University of California, Santa Cruz.

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