Modern man today has really no shaman.

Someone who is in tune with the forces of life around him.

Someone who is a meteor between the life forces and his group, his tribe, his race.

Modern man is not in tune with the force that are going around him, He thinks he is in control of everything.

When actually he's not.

Ceramic artist Christopher Gaston has been influenced by civilizations of the past, especially ancient Greek and American Indian cultures.

The relationship of my work with the American Indians is the ritualistic, the act of doing.

The American Indians did sand paintings.

They did writings on the walls for others to follow and to learn about their past and where they came from.

My work is more actually like Greek colonnades.

This stuff is made out of the earth.

It's clay, it's the earth, when it's fired, it will last long, long, very long time, last longer than I will, hopefully in the future.

When these things are broken or whatever.

Somebody that's living, if there is, will put it back together and just wonder why.

I have these acrylic spheres that I found in the garbage.

I don't know what they were used for, but they're a perfect shape for these hemispheres and globes that I've been making with the clay.

I like to use colored clay and different textures for a visual stimulus, something, some excitement for the eye to look at.

For the columns, I use cardboard tubes that I cut in half and press the clay in there.

I can just get a pile of these columns and spheres and tubes and boxes.

And then afterwards, I can stack them, rearrange them like building blocks.

My sculptures look like they're going to fall over.

That's the whole intent, it's the off balance between man and nature that's going on right now.

These spheres look like they're ready to break, fall apart.

It makes the viewer think that they're gonna fall over on them or smash in front of them.

Modern man's parasitic relationship with the earth gives Gaston a greater appreciation of the Native American's way of life.

He traveled west to explore the canyon lands near Moab, Utah, home to the Hopi Indian tribe.

I made you respect Mother Nature because the only thing that we had on our back to keep us alive was five gallons of water.

And it just, we went through all the ruins, the kivas, the ceremonial pits where the Hopi Navajo Indians.

Did their pipe ceremonials and dance rituals for Mother Earth, Father Sky, and I just got a real close feeling with their way, their respect of the place where they lived.

They were keepers.

They were supposed to take care of the land, not abuse it like I think modern society is today.

It turns around.

Turns around.

It's going to fall.

You know this is okay?

Ancient ideas of ceremony and ritual have been incorporated into a performance piece.

It begins when the sun goes down, the edge of day and night.

The performance piece that I do with my sculptures, the visual is the artwork.

Also, the action is the dance, the ritual.

I'm covered up with slip, liquid clay, that as the piece goes on, the clay dries and cracks off.

So at the beginning, it's all wet and slimy.

At the end, it all crumbled off and dusty.

These pieces light on fire.

Fire, I think, is... Like hope.

It's heat, it's warmth, it is something that we need.

It is like the sun.

Respect Mother Earth and Father Sky.