Turtle Recall

I didn't see much in the way of photogenic turtles in Wisconsin. There's the box turtle. Small, round. Mud turtles. Small, round, black. Also very shy. You usually see them as bumps on a log in a Mississippi backwater that disappear with a splash as soon as your boat gets near. Painted turtles are kinda pretty, but not native, and tend to take over from the local species after they get dumped from the terrarium into the wild. Snapping turtles have a certain prehistoric presence, but I'm not sure I'd want to paint one on a plate.

Sea turtles, though, are another matter. They glide and swoop and look like they're flying, so when I finally gave in to all the requests and tried making turtle pots, it's this lovely hawkbill pattern that I painted. She's drifting weightless above the kelp and turtle grass, in her element under the waves.

Totally shellf-contained.