Each piece by Johnny Ortiz-Concha's is made by hand - of the earth and fired in the earth of Northern New Mexico.

"The wild micaceous clay is dug and processed from the same land that my ancestors of Taos Pueblo have dug for hundreds of years, in the Sangre de Cristo mountains. The clay is largely made up of mica flakes, pink feldspar, rose quartz and sandstone broken down over thousands of years.

Each piece is then hand-built and shaped with sandstone, slipped and burnished with a river stone, pit-fired with rocky mountain red cedar and cured with elk marrow and beeswax - all from the same terrain.

The clay is vernacular to the people I come from, Tu-ah-tah (Taos Pueblo) and where I grew up. For hundreds of years they have been known for their simple utilitarian style of pottery - letting the natural beauty of the clay speak for itself. I dig from the same spots as my ancestors and fire the vessels in a pit surrounded with volcanic stones.

My style is rooted in the same ethos as those I came from, but is also different. The solid black color comes from the carbonizing process in the firing - where the clay is slowly alchemized back into solid form using heat. It absorbs the carbon as I restrict the flow of oxygen to the fire. Unlike traditional pieces I don't slip with a clay that has large mica flakes resulting in a glossy surface, I prefer instead to use an iron rich clay that has lots of small flakes, resulting in something that is not too showy and has a matte texture."