Amulets, Talismans | The Ceramic Art of Michel Pastore & Evelyne Porret — Rikki Ducornet

Ceramic box by Michel Pastore

Michel Pastore and Evelyne Porret

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Long ago I lived in North Africa. I learned that among the Berber peoples, the erotic verses from the Koran are traced on the body of the bride with henna—her hands and feet, belly and breasts. On the night of her wedding, her husband licks her body and swallowing, embodies the sacred erotic.

When in the Loire Valley years later, I saw the ceramics of Michel Pastore and Evelyne Porret, I was stunned by the sight of so many domestic objects that were not only beautiful, but also somehow transcendent. In the deepening shadows the late afternoon, they sparked the air and sizzled—more like amulets and talismans than bowls and plates. I mean to say that if they were destined for domestic pleasure, their emphasis was more on the ecstatic than the domestic. This encounter remains one of the most powerful influences within my creative life. Several of the pieces I saw that day are visible below.

Around the time I returned to the United States, Michel and Evelyne moved to Fayoum, Egypt. There they built a home, a ceramics studio and a kiln of clay brick. Soon after arriving, in 1989, Evelyne opened a studio school for local children which is flourishing to this day.

In 1991, Michel, always protean, and inspired by the weavers of the ancient village of Nagada, became interested in textile and clothes design. With the Lebanese designer, Sylvia Nasralla, he opened a shop in Cairo named Nagada. (If you watch this video of a Nagada fashion show, you will be enchanted.)

— Rikki Ducornet.
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Ceramics by Evelyne Porret (above and below)

Ceramic by Michel Pastore

Pastore/Porret house and studio at Fayoum.

The studio in Fayoum

Pastore and Porret at the studio

A pot made of local clay, from the first firing in the Fayoum studio

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—Ceramics by Michel Pastore & Evelyne Porret; text by Rikki Ducornet.

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Evelyne Porret and Michel Pastore

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Rikki Ducornet

Rikki Ducornet is the author of eight novels as well as collections of short stories, essays, and poems. She has been a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award, is a two-time honoree of the Lannan Foundation, and the recipient of an Academy Award in Literature. Widely published abroad, she is also a book illustrator and painter who exhibits internationally. Her work is held by the Ohio State University Rare Books and Manuscripts Library, the Museo de la Solidaridad Salvador Allende in Chile, McMaster University Museum in Canada, and the Bibliothèque nationale de France. Rikki lives in Port Townsend, Washington.

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