jizos

This series began without a plan. I had committed to a hundred-day intensive practice period with my friend and teacher Koho Vince Anila—one that would include daily meditation, study, journaling, and the creation of one clay and one shodō piece every ten days. On the first morning of that commitment, I sat by the fire with two friends—Andy, who first invited me to try clay, and Tom Matsuda, a sculptor of Buddhist images. I said I didn’t know what to make. Tom said, “Try making Jizos.”

So I made one. A very cute one.

Andy took a look and said, “It’s super cute. I like cute. But I think you can go deeper.”

I didn’t know what he meant exactly. So I started taking clay away.

That’s how Old Man Jizo emerged—and with him, a recognition: I’d made a kind of self-portrait. Worn and tender, but still holding out a bowl.

Over the weeks that followed, I learned more about Jizo, the bodhisattva who responds to suffering, who walks with us in the dark. I began to adapt the form, drawing from personal stories, needs, and devotions: a Jizo for prostration and humility; a kosodate Jizo for my son and his growing family; a wandering Jizo; a sitting Jizo; an Ork Jizo inspired by William Blake; a tiny Jizo based on a photo of Hitomi as a child; a pleading Jizo for times I’ve cried out for help; a Merton Jizo, in homage to my root teacher; and a six-armed Kannon Jizo, a nod to the Japanese tradition that grounds and shapes my practice.

None of these are traditional. All of them are sincere.

A note: all ten of these jizos are awaiting firing in Andy’s kiln. So the images are of them in their greenware state. I will update once I have fired them.