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By Susanne Rockwell

The sculptures seen lounging, standing on their heads and being mermaids in a new campus exhibition certainly have an earthy quality to them. That’s because they are exactly that: made of earth plaster — a green alternative to plaster and cement.

“The goal of this project was to introduce students to sustainable green studio practices,” said art professor Robin Hill, who leads the spring-quarter sculpture class that produced the sculptures. They are on display through June 14 on the south side of Wright Hall.

Using an Undergraduate Instructional Improvement Mini-Grant, Hill brought in Michael Smith to lead a workshop on earth plaster building techniques, preceded by a visit to his Capay Valley farm.

Smith, author of The Art of Natural Building: Design, Construction, Resources, is a cob builder — using earth mixed with sand and straw.

“Collaboration, improvisation and hands-on research were at the heart of the project,” Hill said.

The students gathered sand and clay from the wild, along Cache Creek in Rumsey, northwest of Woodland. Then they applied the earth plaster to wood and chicken wire armatures.

“The varying colors are the result of multiple mixtures utilizing harvested wild clay, recycled studio clay and store-bought clay combined with yellow ochre and red iron oxide pigments,” Hill said.