Hee Octopus Tidepool Oahu Ceramic Art Tile

Octopus in a shallow tidepool on Oahu's North Shore. He'e mauli, the day octopus — the one with the eye that finds yours first. The water is two feet deep, full of urchins and the long shadows of wana spines. The octopus holds still until you stop moving, then unrolls one careful arm across the floor of the pool. Hawaiian fishermen used to whisper to the den before a take, never to it. The kapu was older than the word for kapu. On a good morning the reef holds a dozen of these slow conversations, and none of them are loud.

Slowly infused into the ceramic surface under high heat and pressure, in our family studio in Knoxville, Tennessee.