Creating a world of imaginative art through clay and fire

Creating a world of imaginative art through clay and fire

Xia Shaohua and his clay works based on Peking Opera figures The Buddha once remarked that everything can be found in something as seemingly insignificant as a grain of sand, a dropped leaf or a flower petal. Xia Shaohua sees the world through the medium of clay and fire. […]

Click here to view original web page at www.shine.cn

One of the joys of working with ceramics is the tension between the perceived control of the artist and the immutable fact that the kiln has a mind and will of its own. Xia Shaohua knows this all too well, which is why he took time to say …

“Every time you open the kiln, anything could happen – it could be a perfect work of art or a pile of broken pottery shards,” the pottery artist explained. “It’s always been mysterious and unfathomable, which has enchanted me for many years.”

The life of almost all artists, in almost all mediums, includes times of testing and trial interwoven with times to great triumph and (sometimes) public recognition. Xia Shaohua had this experience and shares it this way …

“The award was a great encouragement for me at the time, because I was struggling between following my artistic path and being realistic and worldly in a big city,” he recalled.

Josh DeWeese Artist Talk at Radius Gallery

Josh DeWeese’s work exudes ceramic wonder: artfully designed, painstakingly crafted, and ultimately given over to the whims of the kiln. He is drawn to the beauty and mystery of high temperature ceramics, to the elements of chance that occur in the firing, to the subtle qualities of raw clays and the vibrant depths of transparent glazes. His pottery summons us to touch, melding art and utility, asserting the gravitas of raw earth into our curated spaces.

DeWeese is currently a Professor of Art teaching ceramics at Montana State University in Bozeman, where he and his wife Rosalie Wynkoop have a home and studio. He served as Resident Director of the Archie Bray Foundation for the Ceramic Arts in Helena for 17 years. He holds an MFA from the New York State College of Ceramics at Alfred, and a BFA from the Kansas City Art Institute. DeWeese has exhibited and taught workshops internationally and his work is included in numerous public and private collections

Sky Above | Earth Below is now on display until April 17th, 2021

View Josh DeWeese's work:
Virtual Tour of the exhibition:
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Studio Talk with Josh DeWeese

Studio Talk with artist Josh DeWeese

Josh DeWeese
McGuireWoods Gallery Art Lab
February 6 @ 11:00 am – April 19 @ 6:00 pm

Josh DeWeese, ceramic artist and Associate Professor of Art teaching ceramics at University of Montana in Bozeman.

Also former Resident Director of the Archie Bray Foundation for the Ceramic Arts in Helena, Montana serving from 1992-2006. DeWeese has exhibited and taught workshops internationally and his work is included in numerous public and private collections.

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Music:
Wholesome by Kevin MacLeod
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Bill Griffith Interview 2019

Welcome to National Clay Week 2019!

For your K-12 Resource Monday, we have a collection of interviews from Sara Truman and her intersections think-tank. This mini-conference of 14 art educators met at Arrowmont in June 2019 to brainstorm and discuss K-12 Resources for students and educators.

Bill Griffith is the Outreach and Partnership Liaison at the Arrowmont School of Arts and Crafts. He shared his experience as an educator in the public school system and as an administrator at Arrowmont.

CLAIRE OLIVER – Beth Cavener Stichter

Beth Cavener Stichter

Beth Cavener Stichter addresses controversial, potentially
embarrassing subject matter head on and in direct opposition to the
reputation of her chosen medium, clay. By employing this classical
genre and emphasizing its primitive and raw characteristics, Cavener
Stichter intentionally provokes art-world prejudices. The Artist thrives in
the depiction of the provocative, blatantly contradicting the traditional
and comfortable uses of her medium and imagery. Cavener Stichter
explores child abuse, pornography, self loathing, and insecurity
through elegantly crafted goat, hare, and hound proxy. "I select
animal subjects," she says, "since the animal body is removed just
enough from my own to establish a distance, yet the personal
relationship is irresistible . . . Here, I become far enough away from
myself to unravel questions previously tangled in a self-conscious
quagmire."

Cavener Stichter cajoles the viewer into looking at the darker side of
the human condition by cloaking it in animal skin. "There are primitive
animal instincts lurking in our own depths, waiting for the chance to
slide past a conscious moment. The sculptures I create focus on
human psychology, stripped of context and rationalization, and
articulated through animal forms. On the surface, these figures are
simply feral and domestic individuals suspended in a moment of
tension. Beneath, they embody the impacts of aggression, territorial
desires, isolation, and pack mentality. I want to pry at those
uncomfortable, awkward edges between animal and human."
By manipulating the properties of clay, the Artist achieves an eloquence
of form and surface unattainable through the use of other mediums.
Despite the fluid, ethereal appearance of her completed works, the
process of construction is painstakingly delicate and time consuming.
Cavener Stichter's primary tool is her own body; she employs the human
form as a scale of relative measurement, and her muscles and mass to
carve and shape the colossal amounts of raw material necessary in her
studio practice. Working from a maquette, she creates her sculptures
from a solid block of clay, her broad, sweeping, gestural passages
leaving their energetic motion behind. She then cuts the work into small
sections, severing the limbs and torso at various points of motion. Each
slice is hollowed out and gently reworked so that the straining of the
muscle and the articulation of skin and fur are brought to life. Inch by
inch this process is repeated, each section being attached to the prior;
an exacting labor which takes months to complete. The Artist says that
she has "learned to read meaning in the subtler signs; a look, the way
one holds one's hands, the tightening of muscles in the shoulders, the
incline of the head, the rhythm of a walk, and the slightest unconscious
gestures. I rely on the animal's body language in my work as a metaphor
for underlying consciousness, transforming the animal subjects into
human psychological portraits."

Cavener Stichter creates frank discussions with her viewer through
anthropomorphic sculpture and a dispassionate objectification of her
subjects. She is cognizant of the danger that the realism of her
creatures and her deliberate choice of a "Martha Stewart color palette"
can encourage: the worst kind of sentimentality. The Artist hopes that
by inducing the viewer to acknowledge their own uncomfortable darker
side, she can inspire a greater understanding of those disparities that
divide our societies today. "The figures are feral and uneasy," she says,
"expressing frustration for the human tendency towards cruelty and lack
of understanding. Entangled in their own internal and external
struggles, my figures are engaged with the subjects of fear, apathy,
violence and powerlessness."

TEXT COURTESY OF:

Claire Oliver Gallery
513 West 26th Street
New York, NY 10001

Telephone: (212) 929-5949
Fax: (212) 255-4699
Info@ClaireOliver.com

Hours of Operation
Tuesday-Saturday 10:00 am – 6:00 pm

VIDEO BY:
O'Delle Abney, Artist / Agent
NYC GALLERY OPENINGS.COM
info@nycgalleryopenings.com

Beth Cavener – Sculptor

Made by co-founder and filmmaker

The sculptures Beth Cavener creates focus on human psychology, stripped of context and rationalization, and articulated through animal and human forms.

Cavener wants to pry at those uncomfortable, awkward edges between animal and human. Entangled in their own internal and external struggles, the figures express frustration for the human tendency towards cruelty and lack of understanding. Something conscious and knowing is captured in their gestures and expressions.

Beth Caveners work:

SPECIAL THANKS
Alessandro Gallo

SOUND DESIGN
Peter Stoel

MUSIC
Matthew Davies

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