ELIZABETH MAE RENFREW

Elizabeth Mae Renfrew
Into and Out of the Womb, Porcelain and black underglaze, gas reduction kiln fired, 2024

I integrate yoga, meditation and art. I facilitate spaces to breathe into feelings, and process emotions using clay. A tremendous connection to self can be found in stillness. A gentle movement practice in alignment with breath allow energy to move through the body. 

I focus on feeling and slowing breath while pressing into the mass of clay. Gently pressing into the clay and releasing correlated with breath… following the sensation of breath into the body and dow into the pelvic bowl…I imagine each impression filling the space with love and gratitude for this experience, in this life, this body, thus far.

I collapse time and space, breathing…. into all the pelvic bowls I came from…. Robin Lynn Switzer, Judy Elizabeth Switzer, Buelah Mae Van Guilder - then into the unknown space. The clay looks like a stretched womb or belly as mine does now. The stretched, broken sections and jagged edges that formed through the process will not be refined. Images painted in black underglaze on the interior of the bowls only from are family photos of these women.

Hidden images, symbolism of form, and the transformative firing represent the changes to the exterior of our being and the internal landscape of the psyche as well as the hidden womb responsible for holding the metamorphosis of motherhood and beyond. Life at times can feel like getting blasted with fire while holding delicate, sacred memories inside and unseen. 

This is utilitarian, expressive and an incredibly forgiving medium to explore. Clay before it is fired can always be returned to its original state. It is a delicate relationship with dirt and water. Every part of the process demands patience, there is no rushing clay, the entire process in a labor of love and commitment to a process of transformation. It is magic. 

I am a sister, daughter, granddaughter, mother, mental health director, national mental health first-aid trainer, reiki provider, energy artist and facilitator of creative healing spaces. 

My focus is art, education, psychology, body movement, energy practices and healing. I have more than 25 years’ experience in these areas while also working full time in the restaurant industry, a spiritually integrated non-profit counseling organization and raising 3 children. 

I am a survivor of domestic violence from childhood and the same relationship I created as an adult while repeating generational patterns of self-sacrificial care. The healing, meditative and transformative qualities that clay/creation hold are the reason that I survived and was able to take my children to create a safe space for healing. I found a Pittsburgh based antiracist integrative raja yoga teacher training that was pivotal to healing, and reorientation to the self that I lost and the self that I became.