Project Tag: Ceramics

12
May
2017
CRYSTAL MOREY

CRYSTAL MOREY

ARTWORK

ARTWORKS & SERIES

THE REPLANTING SERIES

HEY! CERAMIQUE.S Exhibition Installation featuring Crystal Morey "RePlanting: Elephant", "RePlanting: Giraffe Madonna and Child", and "Venus on the Waves: Grizzly", Musee de la Halle Saint Pierre, Paris, France, September 20, 2023 to August 14, 2024

“The urban landscape of my daily life is a stark contrast to the mountains and trees of my childhood. My experiences as a child directly inspire my work today. I am interested in the intellectual, emotional and primitive relationship between humans and their environment. I used to consider mankind to be part of «nature» and subject to natural events. I now realize that it is the biggest variable in changing our planet. Over the past hundred years, humans have altered the planet radically. We are now the driving force behind environmental change. These are the ideas I keep in mind when I create.”

— Crystal Morey, 2022

Over the Water (Rhino and Swan)

Crystal Morey, “The RePlanting: Over the Water (Rhine and Swan)”, 2022, hand-sculpted porcelain, 15 x 12 x 8″.
Crystal Morey, “The RePlanting: Over the Water (Rhine and Swan)”, 2022, hand-sculpted porcelain, 15 x 12 x 8″.
Crystal Morey, “The RePlanting: Over the Water (Rhine and Swan)”, 2022, hand-sculpted porcelain, 15 x 12 x 8″.

Giraffe Madonna and Child

Crystal Morey, “The RePlanting: Giraffe Madonna and Child”, 2022, hand-sculpted porcelain, 11.5 x 8.5 x 6.5″.
Crystal Morey, “The RePlanting: Giraffe Madonna and Child”, 2022, hand-sculpted porcelain, 11.5 x 8.5 x 6.5″.
Crystal Morey, “The RePlanting: Giraffe Madonna and Child”, 2022, hand-sculpted porcelain, 11.5 x 8.5 x 6.5″.

Elephant

Crystal Morey, “The RePlanting: Elephant”, 2022, hand-sculpted porcelain, 10.5 x 13 x 7.5″
Crystal Morey, “African Bush Elephant” 2020, hand-sculpted porcelain, 11 x 12.5 x 7″.
Crystal Morey, “The RePlanting: Elephant”, 2022, hand-sculpted porcelain, 10.5 x 13 x 7.5″

Mountain Lion

Crystal Morey, “Replanting: Mountain Lion” 2022, hand-sculpted porcelain, 9.5 x 6 x 8.5”.
Crystal Morey, “Replanting: Mountain Lion” 2022, hand-sculpted porcelain, 9.5 x 6 x 8.5”.
Crystal Morey, “Replanting: Mountain Lion” 2022, hand-sculpted porcelain, 9.5 x 6 x 8.5”.

Over the Land (Mt. Lion and Unicorn)

Crystal Morey, “The RePlanting: Over the Land (Mt. Lion and Unicorn”, 2022, hand-sculpted porcelain, 17.5 x 11 x 7″.
Crystal Morey, “The RePlanting: Over the Land (Mt. Lion and Unicorn”, 2022, hand-sculpted porcelain, 17.5 x 11 x 7″.
Crystal Morey, “The RePlanting: Over the Land (Mt. Lion and Unicorn”, 2022, hand-sculpted porcelain, 17.5 x 11 x 7″.

VENUS ON THE WAVES SERIES

View More on the Artist’s Solo Show Exhibition

“As a result of human consumption, climate change, and habitat loss, we are experiencing increased responsibility to care for the living creatures around us. Morey?s delicate porcelain works highlight these precarious connections and our roles as advocates and protectors of our most vulnerable species. Her sculptures narrate the interdependence between humans, plants, and animals while cultivating empathy for our changing world.”

— Crystal Morey, 2019

Entangled: Grizzly(Part 2)

Crystal Morey, "Entangled: Grizzly (Part 1)", 2019, hand-sculpted porcelain, 12.75 x 6 x 6".
Crystal Morey, “Entangled: Grizzly (Part 1)”, 2019, hand-sculpted porcelain, 12.75 x 6 x 6″.
Crystal Morey, “Entangled: Grizzly (Part 1)”, 2019, hand-sculpted porcelain, 12.75 x 6 x 6″.
Crystal Morey, “Entangled: Grizzly (Part 1)”, 2019, hand-sculpted porcelain, 12.75 x 6 x 6″.

Three Graces

Crystal Morey, “Three Graces” 2019, hand-sculpted porcelain, 19 x 10 x 8″.
Crystal Morey, “Three Graces” 2019, hand-sculpted porcelain, 19 x 10 x 8″.
Crystal Morey, “Three Graces” 2019, hand-sculpted porcelain, 19 x 10 x 8″.

SCULPTURES

African Bush Elephant

Crystal Morey, “African Bush Elephant” 2020, hand-sculpted porcelain, 11 x 12.5 x 7″.
Crystal Morey, “African Bush Elephant” 2020, hand-sculpted porcelain, 11 x 12.5 x 7″.
Crystal Morey, “African Bush Elephant” 2020, hand-sculpted porcelain, 11 x 12.5 x 7″.

Without Borders/ White Rhino Airlift

Crystal Morey, “Without Borders/ White Rhino Airlift” 2020, hand sculpted porcelain, 16.5 x 13.5 x 10”.
Crystal Morey, “Without Borders/ White Rhino Airlift” 2020, hand sculpted porcelain, 16.5 x 13.5 x 10”.
Crystal Morey, “Without Borders/ White Rhino Airlift” 2020, hand sculpted porcelain, 16.5 x 13.5 x 10”.

ABOUT

CRYSTAL MOREY

CRYSTALMOREY.COM

CV

BIO

STATEMENTS

ABOUT

American, b. 1983, Nevada City, CA
lives and works in Oakland, CA

Crystal Morey sculpts human-animal-plant hybrids as a reflection of our effects on the natural world. Through the delicacy of porcelain, she highlights the struggle of fringe, endangered, and extinct species in an era following rapid industrialization. In her work, these susceptible creatures become indicators of the adverse impacts of human-caused climate change. Morey addresses issues like ocean acidification and habitat consumption while reminding us of nature’s beauty, adaptability, and interconnection. She creates empathy for the most vulnerable, allowing us to hope that it isn’t too late.

In 2006, Morey completed her BFA from the California College of the Arts; she received her MFA from San Jose State University in 2015. Morey has been an artist in residence at The LH Project, Watershed Center for Ceramic Arts, and the Penland School of Craft.

While referencing art historical traditions within her own generation, her work branches into the new contemporary, high craft, and fine art worlds. Her work has been shown internationally, with showcases at the Frick Pittsburgh and the Scripps College Ceramic Annual.

Morey’s work can be viewed in the permanent collections of the Monterey Museum of Art in Monterey, California, and The Crocker Museum of Art in Sacramento, California. She lives and works in Oakland, California, and is represented by Ferrin Contemporary.

ON HER WORK

I find interest in capturing the connections we all share in the natural world around us. Driven by contemporary environmental issues and inspired by art history, I want to illuminate the stories of today, while continuing a visual language of the past. Showing that we are all linked through land and time, dependent on each other for the long-term health of our planet.

Since the Industrial Revolution, human expansion and resource consumption has grown, leading many creatures to live within stressed ecosystems. Through climate change and habitat loss, we find ourselves affecting the wellbeing of plants, animals and the wild lands around us. I am interested in how we as humans understand such difficult situations, find solutions, and continue to move forward.

Through the delicacy of porcelain, I am capturing the environmental situations of today, and the physical and emotional weight they contain. With creatures that share hybrid elements of human, animal and plant attributes, my creations share a heightened sense of interconnectedness and precarious balance.  With particular interests in vulnerable species, my focus is in depicting endangered or extinct creatures and the biodiversity found in their habitats.

Pulling from traditions of realism, craftsmanship, and art historical porcelain, I am looking to incorporate these customs of beauty, while also building a contemporary, science-based, environmental narrative of today. A story that reminds us of the importance of our natural spaces, and that all living creatures are connected through a thread of time and a fragile world.

“Nature/Nurture” Installation View, Crystal Morey, Mara Superior, Kardi Parnamets, 2020.

ON NATURE/NURTURE

I grew up in Northern California of the 1980s and 90s, influenced by the movements of free speech, feminism, and living close to the land. My ideas of gender were rooted in feminine strength, connected to the power of nature. As my love for nature, equality, and art have grown, becoming my own, I have realized the historical absence of female voices depicting our bodies and experiences. Now, as a woman and an artist, I want to reclaim the art historical nude with its powerful beauty, relationship to the natural world, and the ability to share a new, contemporary narrative.

Reclaiming the feminine body as containing autonomy, self-determination, and strength are important in my creations. Pulling from traditions of classical beauty and realism, while also using exaggerated gesture and body positivity is very important. I am continually looking to create figures with emotional strength, luscious sexuality, and evocative forms that share a kind of raw power and self-containment.

FC NEWS & STORIES | CRYSTAL MOREY | Nature/Nurture

Crystal Morey, “Replanting: Mountain Lion” 2022, hand-sculpted porcelain, 9.5 x 6 x 8.5”.

On the Replanting Series

“The urban landscape of my daily life is a stark contrast to the mountains and trees of my childhood. My experiences as a child directly inspire my work today. I am interested in the intellectual, emotional and primitive relationship between humans and their environment. I used to consider mankind to be part of «nature» and subject to natural events. I now realize that it is the biggest variable in changing our planet. Over the past hundred years, humans have altered the planet radically. We are now the driving force behind environmental change. These are the ideas I keep in mind when I create.”

— Crystal Morey, 2022

Ferrin Contemporary, Crystal Morey, “Venus on the Waves” 2019 Installation View.

VENUS ON THE WAVES

Venus on the Waves is in the permanent collection of the Getty Museum, and was shown with Boucher’s original panel grouping of six, at the Legion of Honor’s exhibition, “Casanova: The Seduction of Europe”, in 2018. Boucher’s luscious figures embody weightlessness and beauty, some floating amongst the clouds, others rolling in the surf as sea creatures emerge from the water below. Boucher paints a sugary world of decadence and lust that can only exist in thought, one of longing emotion, physical charm, and a romantic natural world.

The inspiration for “Venus on the Waves” is seeded in the contrast we see in Boucher’s lavish world and today’s land of human consumption and environmental destruction.

The weight, turbulence and unease of our changing natural environment with climate change, habitat loss and ocean acidification is felt in the relationship between these porcelain hybrid creatures. They embody our instinct of yearning, searching for an answer and a place of knowledge and rest.  Carried by creatures of the sea, these figures show a narrative of human, plant and animal connection and dependence, one that encourages the cultivation of balance in our changing natural environment.

EXHIBITIONS

ON VIEW

HEY! CERAMIQUE.S

Musee de la Halle Saint Pierre

Paris, France

September 20, 2023 – August 14, 2024

FEATURED PAST EXHIBITIONS

2023 INTERNATIONAL CERAMIC ART FAIR

Group Exhibition at the Gardiner Museum, Toronto, Ontario

June 8 – 18, 2023

The International Ceramic Art Fair (ICAF) is a 10-day celebration of some of the most compelling recent ceramic art, featuring works by emerging and established artists from a wide range of backgrounds, as well as online and in-person programming by artists and curators.

Crystal Morey, "Replanting: White Rhino Airlift" 2020, hand sculpted porcelain, 19 x 12 x 12"

NATURE/NURTURE

Group Exhibition at Ferrin Contemporary (North Adams, MA) | 2020 & 2021
Virtual Conference at NCECA Rivers, Reflections, and Reinvention | 2021

Group exhibition of twelve contemporary female artists invited to explore the influence of gender and its impact on their practice.

Featuring Works from the Venus on the Waves Series

“Nature/Nurture” Installation View, Crystal Morey, Mara Superior, Kardi Parnamets, 2020.

‘Nature/Nurture’, Installation view, 2020.

ESPRITS LIBRES

 June 17, 2022 – April 1, 2023 | Group Exhibition at La Fondation d’Enterprise Bernardaud (Limoges, France)

Featuring Works from Morey’s “Replanting” & “Venus on the Waves” series

BREAKING GROUND: Women in California Clay

September 10, 2022—February 9, 2023 | Group Exhibition at American Museum of Ceramic Art | Pomona California

Assembled together for the first time in Breaking Ground, these works tell the compelling story of how women artists from California made, and continue to make, significant contributions to the American Studio Ceramics movement in profound and singular ways.

View the Exhibition HERE

Crystal Morey, "Replanting: White Rhino Airlift" 2020, hand sculpted porcelain, 19 x 12 x 12"

CRYSTAL MOREY: VENUS ON THE WAVES

Solo Exhibition at Ferrin Contemporary | 2019

As a result of human consumption, climate change, and habitat loss, we are experiencing increased responsibility to care for the living creatures around us. Morey?s delicate porcelain works highlight these precarious connections and our roles as advocates and protectors of our most vulnerable species. Her sculptures narrate the interdependence between humans, plants, and animals while cultivating empathy for our changing world.

Ferrin Contemporary, Crystal Morey, “Venus on the Waves” 2019 Installation View.

Ferrin Contemporary, Crystal Morey, “Venus on the Waves” 2019 Installation View.

Ferrin Contemporary, Crystal Morey, “Venus on the Waves” 2019 Installation View.

CURRENT + RECENT EXHIBITIONS

NEWS

NEWS & FEATURES

CATALOGS

  • Released September 15, 2023
  • Edited by Anne Richard Bilingual (French / English)
  • 250 pages
  • Shaped cover 28 x 24.5 cm
  • Published by HEY! PUBLISHING

Long considered a minor art because of its particular status at the crossroads of art and craftsmanship, ceramics has emancipated itself artistically by making precisely this hybrid position the basis of its renewal. The truly alchemical dimension of the fire arts lends itself wonderfully to blurring and crossing boundaries.

HEY! CÉRAMIQUE.S Exhibition Catalog

Purchase the catalog here

HEY! CÉRAMIQUES Catalog Cover"HEY! CÉRAMIQUE.S" Musee de la Halle Saint Pierre, Paris, France, September 20, 2023 to August 14, 2024.

HEY! CÉRAMIQUES Catalog Cover “HEY! CÉRAMIQUE.S” Musee de la Halle Saint Pierre, Paris, France, September 20, 2023 to August 14, 2024.

Crystal Morey: Venus on the Waves Catalog

The 8.5 x 11″ booklet includes 16 beautiful pages of images and text from the “Venus on the Waves” exhibition
at Ferrin Contemporary in 2019.

Read more about the exhibition, HERE.

The book also includes a wonderful essay by writer Maria Porges, “Claiming Beauty: Crystal Morey’s Venus on the Waves”.

Excerpt from Maria Porges Essay:

All of Morey’s therianthropes have a kind of contained power, even when their poses might bely such a reading. A closer examination of the passive contrapposto of the standing figures in Three Gracesreveals a kind of watchful alertness. Positioned back to back around a tree stump, they are warriors creating a united defense. Rhino and mountain lion have their arms intertwined, but the gesture looks protective rather than girlishly affectionate. Alert, all three scan the horizon, dependent on each other for safety. As Morey has put it, “The rhino, mountain lion and human are all in danger of habitat loss, and extinction- although the human is just now realizing how delicate her situation is, and how dependent she is on the well -being of the creatures and environments around her.”

Like these three, Morey reminds us, all living creatures are connected. Multiple-figure compositions– a first for her—have enabled her to address increasingly complex issues. The result is a body of work in which several different meanings can be slowly unpacked, even as the immediate physical appeal of the figures provides pleasure. “You can come in at whatever level you want, but hopefully it will make you think about something you haven’t previously considered… I don’t know if this work will make a change, but I hope it instigates a conversation.”

PURCHASE NOW

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Additional works may be available to acquire, but not listed here.

If interested in lists of all works and series: Send us a message

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12
May
2017
KADRI PÄRNAMETS

KADRI PÄRNAMETS

ARTWORK

ARTWORKS & SERIES

ON THE FIRE SCULPTURE & FRAGMENTS OF WAVES SERIES

In 2022, Kadri Pärnamets’ Choreography of Water was exhibited at Ferrin Contemporary in North Adams, MA. The solo exhibition cast the gallery in a sea of hand-built porcelain cups, vases, and cloud forms to explore earth’s most precious resource: water. Now in 2024, Kadri Pärnamets has returned to this idea of water through small-scale ceramic wave studies and her newest and largest endeavor to date: a 7+ foot fire sculpture. This fire sculpture was fired via “petal kiln”– a stand-alone, reusable kiln designed to open like flower petals – fabricated by friend and master kiln-maker, Andres Allik. The monumental work was crafted and unveiled in its final form at Guldagergaard’s Summer festival, Claytopia, in July, 2024. Having displayed a fire sculpture made by Kadri’s husband, Sergei Isupov, years prior, the Claytopia team approached Kadri in 2023 to commission one of her own. Normally working in porcelain, slip, and glaze on smaller scales, the fire sculpture differed greatly from Kadri’s past works. The sculpture was built using stoneware clay, which includes higher amounts of grog (raw, crushed materials containing silica and alumina), resulting in a more rough, textured medium. As it fired, the clay shrunk more than 10%, and any glazes applied to the clay body produced darker hues than when applied to porcelain. The changing and precarious nature of these materials added numerous unpredictable factors, which were only disclosed upon removal from the kiln. These factors directly connect to the larger ideas behind Kadri’s past work: testing life’s constant, unpredictable ups and downs and how we move through and with them. As Kadri contemplates this body of work and what it means to her, she considers the physical and figurative flows of energy and matter in her personal life, her creative process, and the greater push and pulls occurring in the world:

“Everywhere we are surrounded by water, but there are different seas on all sides of us. The seas back home are completely different from the oceans here in the US. Some are calm, some appear scary. Even though it’s all the same water, its characteristics are completely different depending on where you stand.

With so many crazy events happening in the world, on our changing planet, we need ways to ground ourselves. On the physiological level, our moods and ideas change constantly, affecting our day-to-day lives and the people around us. We often need a break from the waves despite the constant movement. Even when the waves are calm, there is still motion, a continuous ebb and flow. My smaller wave forms speak to this feeling of the “sea”; the changing tide, the lows and highs, the stillness and turbulence. Waves themselves move and interact differently, and not just by themselves, but by much larger, planetary forces beyond their control. They, like us, are knocked over, moved, and forced to interact and change with each new moment. My fire sculpture represents the grounding force that keeps us moving through this.”

The fire sculpture was built on-site, in situ, at Guldagergaard over multiple days. The Guldagergaard grounds became her studio, with the sculpture exposed to nature’s changing conditions. The bulbous, biomorphic contours Kadri included in the fire sculpture form referenced motifs seen on her cups, vases, and cloud forms. She also included geometric gestures through the middle of the piece to represent the coalescence of sea to sky, and the abrupt clashes and waning between waves. As she composed her fire sculpture, Kadri expected the contours, ideas, and intentions to shift as she worked. She had to work quickly, engaging her full strength of skill and technique to problem solve as the material dried and reacted to its outdoor environment. This unpredictability informed and dictated how the piece would evolve in its physical qualities, in conversation or contradiction with the forms Kadri imagined in her mind. She encourages the viewer to contemplate their own moments of change, grounding forces, melodies and harmonies in their own lives.

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Kadri Pärnamets, "Fire Sculpture", 2024, Claytopia Summer Festival, SkÌlskør, Denmark, July-August 2024

FRAGMENTS OF WAVES SERIES

MURAKA (LARGE SCULPTURES) SERIES

CLOUD BERRY SERIES

CUPS

"Kadri Pärnaments: CHOREOGRAPHY OF WATER", installation at 1315 MASS MoCA Way, North Adams, MA, November 17, 2022 – January 28, 2023.
"Kadri Pärnaments: CHOREOGRAPHY OF WATER", installation at 1315 MASS MoCA Way, North Adams, MA, November 17, 2022 – January 28, 2023.
"Kadri Pärnaments: CHOREOGRAPHY OF WATER", installation at 1315 MASS MoCA Way, North Adams, MA, November 17, 2022 – January 28, 2023.

VASES

SCULPTURES

“Moor”

“Waggle Dance”

TEAPOTS

“Question of Honor | Lucretia (After Lucas Cranach the Elder) Teapot”

“Steam from Tea – Tribute to Alice in Wonderland”

ABOUT

KADRI PÄRNAMETS

KADRI PÄRNAMETS

CV

BIO

STATEMENTS

KADRIPARNAMETS.COM

ABOUT

Estonian, b. 1968, Rakvere, Estonia
lives and works in Cummington, MA

Kadri Pärnamets works in porcelain using traditional hand building and sculpting techniques to combine surface and form. Her biomorphic, organic forms provide a means to convey her personal interests ranging from fragile, natural environments to female identity. Her surface treatments feature a range of gesture and expression with either abstract shape or narrative figure painting, inspired by painters from the European Renaissance and Impressionist eras, like Lucas Cranach the Elder and Edouard Manet.

Pärnamets’ work has been shown internationally at the Estonian Museum of Applied Art and Design (Tallinn, Estonia), at the International Tea Trade Expo (Shanghai, China), and many others. Since 1996, she has participated in symposiums in Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Switzerland, USA, Norway, and Hungary.

Pärnamets graduated from the Art Institute of Tallinn, Estonia with a BA/MFA in Ceramics. Dividing her time between Estonia and USA, her primary studio is the USA at Project Art in Cummington, MA. She is represented by Ferrin Contemporary.

ON HER WORK

Pärnamets creates works in porcelain using traditional hand building and sculpting techniques to combine surface and form with abstract and representational painting. Pärnamets’ work is characterized by two modalities, abstraction based on natural forms and representation based on reinterpretation of iconic paintings. The central themes of her work are those to which artists have responded over the centuries. Pärnamets’ biomorphic vases and three-dimensional interpretations of classical images focus on humanity’s integral reliance on both nature and art.

DIRECTOR NOTES ON KADRI PÄRNAMETS

Kadri Pärnamets and I met through the social network of the artists the gallery represents, which is often the way I’ve begun relationships that develop long term. This “net” is actually a form of nurturing that connects one artist to another, first through their professional art practice, and over time, growing to become increasingly personal.

We got to know Kadri during the summer she spent at Project Art working in the studio with Sergei Isupov in 2008. Both artists produced independent works, and while working side by side, they also created a collaborative series. Kadri’s biomorphic forms and Sergei’s painted details merged along the lines of the surrealist game, exquisite corpse, when one artist starts and the next one adds, and is something that came naturally to these two artists. Their international lives in Estonia and USA and time working at international symposia and residencies provided time for collaborations, and now with the dual residencies, they work side by side tackling domestic projects in both of their home environments.

During the course of Nature/Nurture, suddenly in quarantine with their daughter, Roosi who was schooling from home, Kadri’s work in the family studio became focused on a series of small works and collaborative home projects at Project Art.

Due to the extended run of Nature/Nurture, we have been given the opportunity to reflect on paths taken, connections made and shared experiences in our now weekly series of FC News & Stories with each issue focusing on an individual artist in the exhibition. The ON NURTURE statements written by each artist acknowledges family, artist mentors, education and, particularly for Kadri, recognition of nature as inspiration and metaphor for her sculptures. Focusing our attention on “small matters”, Kadri’s sculptures of roots and painted details of common insects and pollinators recognize the foundation of our ecosystem and our inter-dependence – something that has become more obvious to us all as we observe the impact of global warming and the spread of the coronavirus.

ON NATURE/NURTURE

My new work is drawn from my roots. Focusing on the little simple things in nature, like bugs and their sounds, these things give us an understanding of time and space. Wherever I hear the sounds of the first fly in the spring or a mosquito buzz in summer I’m reminded of how important it is to keep balance in our surroundings and to appreciate the annual life cycles that begin from most ordinary and common things. Small matters.

FC NEWS & STORIES | NATURE/NURTURE | Kadri Pärnamets | Small Matters and Roots & Pollinators

ON ICONIC INFLUENCES

Kadri Pärnamets presents exquisite paintings of iconic images on three dimensional, voluminous, black and white cloud forms.  Focusing on gesture and expression, Pärnamets selects known classics of female beauty by painters from the European Renaissance and Impressionist eras, like Lucas Cranach the Elder and Edouard Manet.  Having grown up surrounded by these paintings in museums and books, from childhood to present, she has studied and reflected on the women’s expressions and context.  Revisiting them during various periods of her life, and now as a mother and wife, she has chosen mythical figures to reflect on the human condition.  Sacrifice, service and devotion are seen through the portraits of Venus and Lucretia by Cranach, the bathers of Ingres, nudes of Manet and religious images of Saint Agnes.

ON HER PROCESS

My process involves collecting senses, feelings, observations and generally, following my intuition. I use this thoughtful, meditative process to guide me towards the abstract forms and associated colors to express these internal, psychological thoughts. The emotional content of my life is translated and expressed through shapes and colors. I use the plastic expressive qualities of clay in forming the shapes. Color is added to the surface through abraded layers of complimentary colors.

EXHIBITIONS

FEATURED

Kadri Pärnamets: MURAKA | Ferrin Contemporary, Cummington, MA

2025 | Solo Exhibition at Ferrin Contemporary | Cummington, MA

September 20th through November 15th, 2025

The works in Muraka continue themes of abstract biomorphic forms inspired by water, air, and the changing environment of the river ecosystem. Pärnamets uses water as a metaphor; her multicolored surfaces and organic forms visually reference water’s vast, expansive body that connects land and sky and its forces that impact both protect and threaten the land, earth’s inhabitants and possibly humanity itself.

View the exhibition page HERE

Kadri Parnamets, 2025, Summer Gallery at Ferrin Contemporary, John Polak Photography
Kadri Parnamets, 2025, Summer Gallery at Ferrin Contemporary, John Polak Photography
Kadri Parnamets, 2025, Summer Gallery at Ferrin Contemporary, John Polak Photography
Kadri Parnamets, 2025, Summer Gallery at Ferrin Contemporary, John Polak Photography

Sergei Isupov & Kadri Pärnamets in CLAYTOPIA Summer Festival | Guldagergaard, SkÌlskør, Denmark

2024 | Group Exhibition at Claytopia at Guldagergaard | SkÌlskør, Denmark

July 10th through August 10th, 2024

Claytopia is Guldagergaard’s initiative geared towards engaging the public, offering a unique space within the beautiful park surrounding Guldagergaard.

View the exhibition page HERE

Kadri Pärnamets, “Fragments of Waves” Grouping, 2024, porcelain, slip, glaze, John Polak Photography.
Kadri Pärnamets, “Fragments of Waves 1”, 2024, porcelain, slip, glaze, John Polak Photography.
Kadri Pärnamets, “Fragments of Waves” Grouping, 2024, porcelain, slip glaze, various dimensions, John Polak Photography.
Kadri Pärnamets, “Fragments of Waves”, 2024, porcelain, slip, glaze

CHOREOGRAPHY OF WATER

Solo Exhibition at Ferrin Contemporary (North Adams, MA) | 2022

Kadri Pärnamets: THE CHOREOGRAPHY OF WATER featured porcelain sculptures, vases, and cups as a meditation on this universal element.

View the Exhibition Page, HERE.

“Kadri Pärnaments: CHOREOGRAPHY OF WATER”, installation at 1315 MASS MoCA Way, North Adams, MA, November 17, 2022 – January 28, 2023.
“Kadri Pärnaments: CHOREOGRAPHY OF WATER”, installation at 1315 MASS MoCA Way, North Adams, MA, November 17, 2022 – January 28, 2023.
“Kadri Pärnaments: CHOREOGRAPHY OF WATER”, installation at 1315 MASS MoCA Way, North Adams, MA, November 17, 2022 – January 28, 2023.
Kadri Pärnamets: Choreography of Water installation, 2022 | featured in Ceramics Now
“Kadri Pärnaments: CHOREOGRAPHY OF WATER”, installation at 1315 MASS MoCA Way, North Adams, MA, November 17, 2022 – January 28, 2023.

CURRENT + RECENT

REVIVE, REMIX, RESPOND

REVIVE, REMIX, RESPOND
THE FRICK PITTSBURGH 7227 Reynolds St., Pittsburgh, PA February 17–May 27, 2018 ABOUT THE EXHIBITION In 2017, twenty contemporary artists were invited to respond to and produce new works that...
VIEW THE EXHIBITION

THE WOMEN

THE WOMEN
THE WOMEN Oct 28, 2017 – Apr 21, 2018 Ferrin Contemporary 1315 MASS MoCA Way, North Adams, MA Click here for details. Works on view include recent pieces by women whose primary medium is clay and selected works from private and artist archives by female potters and sculptors. The Women provides Ferrin Contemporary an opportunityContinue reading →
VIEW THE EXHIBITION

NEWS & FEATURES

NEWS & FEATURED

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Additional works may be available to acquire, but not listed here.

If interested in lists of all works and series: Send us a message

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12
May
2017
PETER PINCUS

PETER PINCUS

ARTWORK

ARTWORKS & INSTALLATIONS

THETIS CONFINED

On view in PORTLAND VASE: MANIA AND MUSE | Crocker Art Museum | June 9 – September 8, 2024

READ ABOUT THE MAKING OF Thetis Confined

WATCH VIDEO

RECENTLY ON VIEW AT ICAF 2024

Available works | Ferrin Contemporary

INQUIRE HERE

THE INCOMPLETE COLLECTION

Solo Exhibition at Rochester Institute of Technology | Rochester, NY | August 18 – September 24, 2023

WORKS INSPIRED BY Sol LeWitt

The Art Gallery at Eastern Connecticut State University

SCRATCH & SPIN AMPHORA

LOSING #422 (Group of 5 of the 15 Vessels)

ABOUT

PETER PINCUS

Peter Pincus Artist Portrait 2024

FOR MORE

PETERPINCUS.COM

CV

BIO

ABOUT

b. 1982 Rochester, NY,
lives and works in Penfield, NY

Peter Pincus is well known for work that combines exquisite form and intense color through porcelain vessels and tile compositions. Driven by inquiry, his practice blends color theory, the history of decorative arts and cutting-edge technical experimentation in ceramics. As an artist and designer, Pincus continues to garner national attention for his research-based practice that includes the Wedgwood collection at the Birmingham Museum of Art (AL) and, most recently, an examination of several conceptual works by Sol LeWitt at MASS MoCA (North Adams, MA).

Represented by Ferrin Contemporary since 2015, Pincus has participated in multiple exhibitions, including Glazed & Diffused (2015), Revive, Remix, Respond (2018), and two solo exhibitions, PETER PINCUS: Channeling Josiah Wedgwood (2018) and ART IN THE AGE OF INFLUENCE: Peter Pincus | Sol LeWitt (2020). Pincus has exhibited widely at galleries, art fairs and museums throughout the US. His work can be found in numerous private and public collections including the Daum Museum of Contemporary Art (Sedalia, MO), Everson Museum of Art (Syracuse, NY), The Museum of Fine Arts (Houston, TX), ASU Art Museum Ceramics Research Center (Tempe, AZ), Schien-Joseph International Museum (Alfred, NY) and The Arkansas Arts Center (Little Rock, AR). Pincus is the recipient of the Lewis Comfort Tiffany Award in 2017.

Pincus received both his BFA (2005) and MFA (2011) from Alfred University, Alfred, NY. He has been a resident artist at the Mendocino Art Center in Mendocino, CA and Archie Bray Foundation, Helena, MT, taught at Haystack School Mountain School of Craft and worked at the Genesee Center for Arts and Education in Rochester, NY as the Studio Manager and Resident Artist Coordinator. In Fall 2014, Peter joined the faculty as Assistant Professor of Art at the School for American Crafts at Rochester Institute of Technology.

Peter Pincus Portrait, The Incomplete Collection, Installation at RIT, 2023

ON HIS WORK

As an early career ceramic artist, I am part of a lively and rapidly changing conversation in which the worlds of art, craft, and design are increasingly defined not only by their distinctions, but also by their similarities and relationships to one another. There is tremendous meaning in the transcendence of the pot to engage in all of these ideologies; object of substantial craftsmanship, object of use, object of design intellect, and object of conceptual metaphor.

I produce three-dimensional paintings out of pots. The big challenge is to study and make objects that have a distinct location in the home, using our familiarity toward them to instigate new discussions about the role of the vessel in our place and time. I focus on containers that are status symbols saved for special occasions, generally deemed distinct because of the value of what they hold rather than for what they are. But to me, in between such occasions, they become canvases that visually illustrate the defining spirit of the times. They are useful as well as opulent. But they can be so much more. 

—Peter Pincus

ON PETER PINCUS: Channeling Josiah Wedgwood

“Obsession—not mine but Josiah Wedgwood’s—was the impetus for Peter Pincus: Channeling Josiah Wedgwood. The eighteenth-century English potter and entrepreneur was determined to patent the reproduction process of Etruscan pottery. His drive to claim intellectual ownership over these ancient vessels is one of his many fixations that brought me to Birmingham, Alabama and the Dwight and Lucille Beeson Wedgwood Collection at the Birmingham Museum of Art.

In examining the work I began to understand the diversity of thought and skill involved in Wedgwood’s pottery production. I concluded that the best way to understand fully his obsession was to combine intellectual understanding and the making process by mimicking his mimicry.

This exhibition is an extension of my lectures and discussions on Wedgwood’s innovative thinking as it related to clay and the Industrial Revolution and how that could serve as a context for viewing contemporary ceramics, culture, and technology. This body of work is a preliminary attempt to challenge myself by consciously linking this study of history with my creative practice.”

Peter Pincus, Artist Portrait with Sol LeWitt, MASS MoCA

ON ART IN THE AGE OF INFLUENCE: Peter Pincus | Sol Lewitt

“There is a big difference between being influenced by and being in conversation with. As an artist and educator, I am eager to acknowledge those who have elevated my thinking through their work, and to consciously engage with influence as a productive, and insightful element of studio practice. This exhibition is an opportunity to celebrate LeWitt’s approach to making as a foundation, from which I can challenge myself to see new things and grow.”

– Peter Pincus

EXHIBITIONS

CURRENT & RECENT EXHIBITIONS

PORTLAND VASE: MANIA AND MUSE

2024 | Group Exhibition at Crocker Art Museum | Sacramento, CA

Feature of new works by Peter Pincus

June 9 – September 8, 2024

Thierry Laporte Photography

ABSOLU. 

2024 | Group Exhibition at La Fondation d’Enterprise Bernardaud | Limoges, France

Feature of new works by Peter Pincus

June 21, 2024 – March 29, 2025

INTERNATIONAL CERAMIC ART FAIR 2024

2024 | International Ceramic Art Fair 2024 | Toronto, ON

Feature works by Peter Pincus, Linda Sikora, & Jacqueline Bishop

May 23 – June 2, 2024

PETER PINCUS: The Incomplete Collection

2023 | Solo Exhibition at Rochester Institute of Technology | Rochester, NY

Solo exhibition of old and new works

August 18 – September 24, 2023

CALL SOL: The Enduring Legacy of Sol LeWitt

2023 | Group Exhibition at The Art Gallery at Eastern Connecticut State University | Willimantic, CT

Feature of new works by Peter Pincus

August 23rd – October 27th, 2023

ART IN THE AGE OF INFLUENCE: PETER PINCUS | SOL LEWITT

2020 | Solo Exhibition at Ferrin Contemporary | North Adams, MA

Feature of works by Peter Pincus inspired by three of Sol LeWitt’s wall drawings, #340, #422 and #289, as seen first-hand in Sol LeWitt: A Wall Drawing Retrospective at MASS MoCA.

July 11 – October 11, 2020

ON VIEW IN PERMANENT COLLECTIONS

ARKANSAS MUSEUM OF FINE ARTS | Little Rock, AR

PETER PINCUS, “A Familiar Kind of Riddle,” 2018, Arkansas Museum of Fine Arts Foundation Collection: Purchase, Contemporaries Fund. 2021.008.001. John Polak Photography, courtesy of Ferrin Contemporary.

SELECT PAST EXHIBITIONS

ABSOLU.

ABSOLU.

La Fondation d’Enterprise Bernardaud | Limoges, France
June 21, 2024 – March 29, 2025
Featuring Peter Pincus

VIEW THE EXHIBITION

NEWS & FEATURES

NEWS & FEATURES

Peter Pincus Featured in the Berkshire Eagle

Peter Pincus Featured in the Berkshire Eagle
Ceramics artist draws inspiration from LeWitt retrospective Berkshire Eagle, Jennifer Huberdeau July 12, 2020 "A day spent exploring in the Sol LeWitt retrospective at Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art has...
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UPCOMING EVENTS

UPCOMING EVENTS
FALL & WINTER WITH FERRIN CONTEMPORARY   FERRIN CONTEMPORARY, located on the campus of MASS MoCA, lies in the heart of the Berkshires. The gallery is located at 1315 MASS...
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VIDEOS

VIDEOS

PETER PINCUS’ SNAP SNAP VIDEO

As this unusual time has moved us all to new digital and virtual platforms, we’re happy to present our In-Progress News & Media Page on our website, which includes our Newsletter Archives, Press & Blog Posts, Director’s Notes, Instagram Feed & this Video Library.

Thank you to the Always Creative Peter Pincus for our Newest & Most Amusing Video Yet!

PETER PINCUS VIRTUAL TOUR

Artist Peter Pincus narrates this virtual tour of his 2020 exhibition, ART IN THE AGE OF INFLUENCE: Peter Pincus | Sol LeWitt, presented at Ferrin Contemporary’s gallery on the campus of MASS MoCA in North Adams, MA.

View Virtual Tour: ART IN THE AGE OF INFLUENCE: Peter Pincus | Sol LeWitt

EVERSON MUSEUM OBJECT STUDIES

Peter Pincus in conversation with Garth Johnson, Everson Museum of Art & Anne Forschler, Birmingham Museum of Art. The discussion will include a video tour of “ART IN THE AGE OF INFLUENCE: Peter Pincus | Sol Lewitt” at Ferrin Contemporary with director Leslie Ferrin on the campus of MASS MoCA, North Adams, MA. Pincus will be speaking from his studio in Rochester, NY.

View Ferrin Contemporary & Peter Pincus | In the Everson Museum’s Online Classes & Studio Tours

RIT PROFESSOR AND CERAMICS ARTIST PETER PINCUS ON SOL LEWITT’S LEGACY 

“This talk is part of a series of events centered around the ECSU gallery exhibition ‘Cal Sol: The Enduring Legacy of Sol Lewitt.‘ Here, Rochester-born artist and Professor Peter Pincus delves into the many influences that have shaped his artistic process. Pincus discusses the innovative courses he teaches at the Rochester Institute of Technology, highlighting the intertwining of his identity as both a teacher and an artist.”

READ MORE ABOUT THE VIDEO ON YOUTUBE

AVAILABLE FROM COLLECTIONS

REFIND: Peter Pincus

At Schaller Gallery | Available Works

INQUIRE

INQUIRE

Additional works may be available to acquire, but not listed here.

If interested in lists of all works and series: Send us a message

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12
May
2017
AKIO TAKAMORI

AKIO TAKAMORI

AVAILABLE FROM COLLECTIONS

Works by Akio Takamori are available for sale, gift, or acquisition from Private Collections. Please inquire for pricing and availability.

INQUIRE / PLACE HOLD

Lovers Teapot

Akio Takamori

  • Date of Production : circa 1980
  • Maker ‏ : ‎ Akio Takamori
  • Material ‏ : ‎ porcelain
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 11 x 8.5 x 8 inches
  • Provenance: Made in the Artists’ Studio (Akio Takamori) (1980) to Marc & Diane Grainer Collection.

DESCRIPTION & DETAILS
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Man & Woman Teapot

Akio Takamori

  • Date of Production : circa 1991
  • Maker ‏ : ‎ Akio Takamori
  • Material ‏ : ‎ porcelain
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 9 x 9 inches
  • Provenance: Made in the Artists’ Studio (Akio Takamori) (1980) to Marc & Diane Grainer Collection.

DESCRIPTION & DETAILS
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Akio Takamori

b. 1950, Nobeoka, Miyazaki, Japan
d.  2017, Seattle, WA

Takamori was a seminal figure in ceramic art, whose work over the past thirty years has left an enduring impact on the Pacific Northwest arts and the medium itself. His work is often autobiographical, drawing on his life in Japan, his family, and mythological themes. He is known for his coil-built figurative sculptures in which the narrative painting defines the form.  Takamori explored themes of cultural identity by engaging the history of Eastern and Western aesthetics. Bold form and color defines his body of work, which is highly expressive of human emotion and sensuality.

Akio Takamori was born and raised in Japan. He has been exhibiting in the United States, Europe and Asia since the mid 1980s. Takamori received his BFA from the Kansas City Art Institute in 1976 and his MFA from the New York State College of Ceramics, Alfred University in 1978.

Takamori’s work is included in numerous collections including the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art in Kansas City, Los Angels County Museum of Art, Victoria & Albert Museum in London, Ariana Museum in Geneva, the Seattle Art Museum, and the Museum of Arts and Design in New York City. He is the recipient of numerous awards, including three National Endowment for the Arts Visual Artists Fellowship Grants (1986, 1988, 1992), the Joan Mitchell Foundation Painters and Sculptors Grant (2006), and the USA Ford Fellowship (2011). Takamori was a professor of art at the University of Washington. He lived and worked in Seattle.

–Read more on the James Harris website

VIEW ADDITIONAL COLLECTIONS

12
May
2017
PAUL SCOTT

PAUL SCOTT

ARTWORK

HIGHLIGHTED ARTWORKS

New American Scenery Series

Paul Scott has produced multiple series, including his recently touring New American Scenery Series, in which many of the developing bodies of work are included.

Paul Scott, "Cumbrian Blue(s), New American Scenery, Sampler Jug No:10, Shelburne & Sugar", 2024, Transfer print collage on pearlware jug with platinum lustre,14.5 x 15.25 x 12.25", 360mm x 390mm x 290mm. Shelburne Museum Collection. Artwork by Paul Scott, Photography by Chris Lewis.
Paul Scott, "Cumbrian Blue(s), New American Scenery, Posy Vase No: 2, No Human Being is Illegal", 2022, transfer print collage on pearlware posy vase, 6.5 x 4.5 x 3.25", 165mm x 125mm x 85mm.

Please check back regularly as we are correlating the artist’s statements with developing displays and informational pdfs.

As always, please inquire or contact us for more details or lists of available artworks.

American Cities & Landscapes

Views of New York

Paul Scott, "Cumbrian Blue(s), New American Scenery, View of Albany, New York, No. 2", 2019, transfer print collage on salvaged Syracuse China with pearlware glaze, 11 x 11 x 1".

Energy & Environment

Posy Vases

Cumbrian Blue(s) New American Scenery, Posy Vase 3, Broken Treaties. Transfer print collage on pearlware posy vase, 165mm x 125mm x 85mm. Paul Scott 2022.

Race, Indigeneity & Immigration

Broken Treaties

Paul Scott, "Cumbrian Blue(s), New American Scenery, Broken Treaties, Standing Rock, After Ryan Vizzions, with Mega Mae Plenty Chief, Lakota Oyate on horseback, No. 3", 2022, transfer print collage on Wm Penn's Treaty transferware plate by Thomas Goodwin c.1835, 10.5 x 10.5 x 1.25". Red, blue, and white transferware plate, with updated decal imagery of Standing Rock, ND. The imagery is of Mega Mae Plenty Chief, a Lakota Oyate on horseback, posed in front of the police and military present and opposing. They are the single figure if front of the entire army presence, signifying the resistance to drilling for oil in the US on Native American Lands. Subject matter for the artwork includes the following artist series: New American Scenery, Native American, Antique, Energy, Environment, Race, Indigeneity

Samplers & Souvenirs

Paul Scott, "Cumbrian Blue(s), New American Scenery, Souvenir of Selma, No. 3", 2020, transfer print collage on pearlware plate, 12 x 12 x 1.25". New American Scenery, American Cities, Race, Souvenir Souvenir of Selma AL. From Selma, Still a City of Slaves.. by Chris Arnade in the Guardian, 4 Feb 2016. … The Edmund Pettus Bridge is recognizable from newsreels of Bloody Sunday, when marchers were beaten by the police, or when President Obama came to mark the 50th anniversary of that day. The central street beyond the bridge is three short blocks filled with shops catering to tourists.Yet if you walk beyond those blocks you see the ugliness of poverty that is modern Selma: dilapidated and boarded-up homes tagged with gang symbols, empty lots littered with vodka bottles and fast-food wrappers, and sterile low-income projects. You see men clustered on corners selling drugs, and on the better-kept homes you see sign after sign urging, “Stop the violence”. You don’t see working factories, only empty ones being torn down for scrap. You see a population disenfranchised, economically and politically. It makes Selma, a symbol of past civil rights victories, a symbol of current civil rights failures. On salvaging bricks from an old cotton warehouse…“This is slave work, that’s what it is, but the only work around. Kind of funny when you think about it, because them bricks were probably made by slaves. That is Selma for you, though: still a city of slaves.” “…..special things DID happen here. Just wish they would happen again.” (Escrow, Selma resident) Celebrates the 2018 anniversary walk in Selma Alabama….. The annual event commemorates ‘Bloody Sunday’, March 7 1965, when John Lewis & Hosea Williams led 525 peaceful civil rights protestors across the bridge in Selma. En-route to Montgomery, they were stopped by State Troopers+Sheriff’s Deputies, who brutally set upon them, indiscriminately gassing + beating men, women, & children. Media coverage of the event shocked the world…

Sampler Jugs

Paul Scott, "Cumbrian Blue(s), New American Scenery, Sampler Jug No:10, Shelburne & Sugar", 2024, Transfer print collage on pearlware jug with platinum lustre,14.5 x 15.25 x 12.25", 360mm x 390mm x 290mm. Shelburne Museum Collection. Artwork by Paul Scott, Photography by Chris Lewis.

Cup Plates

Paul Scott, "Cumbrian Blue(s), Indian Point cup plate, 4/50", 2021, transferware print on pearlware cup plate, 4.25 x 4.25 x .5". Collaborative work with Paul Holdway (former head of engraving at Spode). Tissue print transfer taken from a copper plate engraved by Paul Holdway, Paul Scott 2021.

Prints

Paul recently developed a series of photogravure prints with printmaking Jon Goodman. Email info@ferrincontemporary.com for a list of available prints. 

ABOUT

PAUL SCOTT

ABOUT

FOR MORE

CUMBRIANBLUES.COM

CV

BIO

English, b. 1953, Darley Dale, Derbyshire, England
lives and works in Cumbria, UK

Paul Scott is a Cumbrian-based artist with a diverse practice and an international reputation. Creating individual pieces that blur the boundaries between fine art, craft and design, he is well known for research into printed vitreous surfaces, as well as his characteristic blue and white artworks in glazed ceramic.

Scott’s artworks can be found in public collections around the globe – including The National Museum of Art, Architecture and Design Norway, the Victoria and Albert Museum London, National Museums Liverpool, Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh and Brooklyn Art Museum USA. Commissioned work can be found in a number of UK museums as well as public places in the North of England, including Carlisle, Maryport, Gateshead and Newcastle Upon Tyne. He has also completed large-scale works in Hanoi, Vietnam and Guldagergård public sculpture park in Denmark.

A combination of rigorous research, studio practice, curation, writing and commissioned work ensures that his work is continually developing. It is fundamentally concerned with the re-animation of familiar objects, landscape, pattern and a sense of place. He was Professor of Ceramics at Oslo National Academy of the Arts (KHiO) from 2011–2018. Scott received his Bachelors of Art Education and Design at Saint Martin’s College and Ph.d at the Manchester Institute for Research and Innovation in Art and Design in Manchester, England.

His current research project New American Scenery has been enabled by an Alturas Foundation artist award, Ferrin Contemporary, and funding from Arts Council England. More on New American Scenery, here.

Paul Scott is represented by Ferrin Contemporary in the USA and The Scottish Gallery in Scotland.

ON HIS WORK

Paul Scott, "Cumbrian Blue(s), New American Scenery, Sampler Jug, No. 7 (After Stubbs)", 2021, transfer print collage on pearlware jug, 15 x 14 x 11.75". transfer print collage on pearlware jug designed by Paul Scott and Ed Bentley. Model made by Ed Bentley, fabricated by "Ceramics by Design", Longton, Stoke on Trent, England The inside, ‘Cumbrian Blue(s), New American Scenery, Sampler Jug No:7, (After Stubbs)'. Decal collage on pearlware jug, 390mm x 350mm x 50mm. Paul Scott 2021 transferware; blue & white; pearlware; Cumbrian Blue(s); sampler; Stubbs; Black Lives Matter Protests; Police riot; New American Scenery; collage; decal; pearlware; Paul Scott; Joseph Stubbs; Detroit Ghost gardens; Angola 3: Pipelines and Peltier; Standing Rock; Belle Island; Cape Coast Castle; Portland; Selma; Uranium

Paul Scott, "Cumbrian Blue(s), New American Scenery, Broken Treaties, Standing Rock, After Ryan Vizzions, with Mega Mae Plenty Chief, Lakota Oyate on horseback, No. 3", 2022, transfer print collage on Wm Penn's Treaty transferware plate by Thomas Goodwin c.1835, 10.5 x 10.5 x 1.25". Red, blue, and white transferware plate, with updated decal imagery of Standing Rock, ND. The imagery is of Mega Mae Plenty Chief, a Lakota Oyate on horseback, posed in front of the police and military present and opposing. They are the single figure if front of the entire army presence, signifying the resistance to drilling for oil in the US on Native American Lands. Subject matter for the artwork includes the following artist series: New American Scenery, Native American, Antique, Energy, Environment, Race, Indigeneity

Paul Scott, a material-based conceptual artist, creates ceramic work that blurs the boundaries between art, craft, and design. With a penchant for rescuing cast-offs, he restores them to a new life by using them as a canvas for biting social commentary. His work tells stories that explore the unexpected movement of images through materials, media, cultures, politics, histories, and geographies, inviting us to see these objects in a new way.

Scott is an authority on printed vitreous surfaces. His research, artwork, and book, Ceramics in Print, has been instrumental in the phenomenal growth of printmaking techniques in contemporary ceramics.

Scott’s latest book, Horizon: Transferware and Contemporary Ceramics, co-edited with Knut Astrup Bull, explores the complex journey of ideas and images to their realization in blue and white, then multicoloured tablewares. Blending historical enquiry with contemporary practice, the book illustrates how artists re-appropriate this historical genre. Text and visual essays explore unexpected political and cultural themes, changing the way we view these familiar objects.

In the fall of 2013, Scott, a resident of the UK, traveled in the US, visiting museum collections of transferware and participating in artist residencies at the Clay Studio in Philadelphia and Project Art in Massachusetts. His series, New American Scenery, presents a striking duality with current American imagery applied to antique china pieces that brings the past forward, exposes us to how we have shaped our landscape, and hints at what the future may hold.

Scott embarked on a new body of work in 2014 that involves the physical collaging of antique fragments using traditional ceramic conservation methods to join the elements. The mending, melding, and juxtaposition of the separate components creates completely new work, proving, again, that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.

Scott’s work can be found in public and private collections around the globe.

Ferrin Contemporary represents Scott in the US. His work can be viewed online at FerrinContemporary.com, at Project Art in Cummington, MA, and at various venues in the US.

NEW AMERICAN SCENERY

NEW AMERICAN SCENERY

NAS | GUIDE

NAS | FEATURES

American Cities & Landscapes

Views of New York

Energy & Environment

Posy Vases

Race, Indigeneity & Immigration

Broken Treaties

Samplers & Souvenirs

Sampler Jugs

In New American Scenery, Scott scrutinizes the American landscape from a contemporary perspective, one that grapples with issues of globalization, energy generation and consumption, capitalism, social justice, immigration, and the human impact on the environment. The images that Scott creates for his ceramics depict unsettling views of nuclear power plants, aging urban centers, abandoned industrial sites, wildfires, and isolating walls. As representations of the American landscape, they suggest a subversion of the picturesque aesthetic—the unpicturesque picturesque—and a new, disturbing norm.

“NAS” includes the following bodies of work, many of which were conceived on location and/or with insights from significant collaborators. Each title below represents a sub-series containing multiple iterations and/or designs: American Cities & Landscapes, Broken Treaties, Energy & Environment, Posy Vases, Race, Indigeneity & Immigration, Samplers, Sampler Jugs, Souvenirs, Views of New York.

Click the Artworks Tab on the left to learn more about each series.

VIEW ALL PAUL SCOTT EXHIBITIONS & TOURS

NAS | PAST TOURS

NEW AMERICAN SCENERY IN THE US

“Paul Scott: New American Scenery” at the Albany Institute of History & Art, Albany, NY, August 13, 2022 to December 31, 2022.
“Paul Scott: New American Scenery” at the Albany Institute of History & Art, Albany, NY, August 13, 2022 to December 31, 2022.
“NEW AMERICAN SCENERY: The Art of Paul Scott”at the Albany Institute of History & Art

Visit these museums in the US that have recently acquired work
from Scott’s American Scenery series.

Crocker Art Museum
Birmingham Museum of Art
Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts
Los Angeles County Museum of Art
RISD Museum
Boston MFA
Brooklyn Museum
Newark Museum
Carnegie Museum of Art
Mount Holyoke Art Museum
Chipstone Foundation

IN PUBLIC COLLECTIONS

Mount Holyoke College Art Museum: (right) George Inness, American (1825-1894), “Saco Ford: Conway Meadows” 1876, oil on canvas. (center top) Homer Dodge Martin, American (1836-1897), “A Glimpse of Lake Placid,” 1887, oil on canvas. (center bottom) Paul Scott, “Scott’s Cumbrian Blue(s), American Scenery, Hudson River, Indian Point No. 4, ” 2015, ceramic transfer decal. (left) Albert Bierstadt, American (1830-1902), “Hetch Hetchy Canyon,” 1875, oil on canvas

ADDITIONAL US COLLECTIONS

Alturas Foundation, San Antonio, TX
Arizona State University Art Museum, Tempe, AZ
Boston Museum of Fine Arts, Boston MA
Birmingham Museum of Art, Birmingham, AL
Brooklyn Museum, Brooklyn, NY
Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh, PA
Chipstone Foundation, Milwaukee, WI
Copeland Borough Council Collection, Oregon College of Art and Craft Collection, Portland, OR
Crocker Art Museum, Sacramento, CA
Denison University, Granville, OH
Kohler Company, Kohler, WI
Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, CA
Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts, Montgomery, AL
Mount Holyoke College Art Museum, South Hadley, MA
New York Historical Society, New York, NY
Newark Art Museum, Newark, NJ
Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, MA
Philadelphia Museum of Art, Pennsylvania, PA
RISD Museum, Providence, RI
Renwick Gallery of the Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, DC

SELECT SERIES STATEMENTS

“New American Scenery, Visitors to America”

The visitor, the stranger, the foreigner in a new land, encountering things that are both very familiar and yet disorienting….

I follow a tradition, a long line of visitors to America who’ve written about and depicted thecountry.

READ MORE/VIEW PDF

“New American Scenery, the Background….”

Transferware:

In the late 18th century, blue and white Staffordshire transferwares were developed to imitate painted Chinese export porcelains. By the early 19th century printed patterns had expanded to include images of the Grand Tour and of Empire. A particular dark blue version of the genre became popular in the United States, & from Liverpool, Staffordshire potters exported huge quantities of decorated wares depicting American subjects & landscape. Later that century these were to become highly collectible. … “.

READ MORE/VIEW PDF

“New American Scenery, Cape Coast Castle….”

This has a direct link to toppled Bristol statue of slave trader Edward Colston of the Royal African Company (1680 – 1692)… Its administration centre was Cape Coast Castle in current day Ghana. Commenting on the UK’s Black Lives Matter protests in the wake of George Floyd’s death on BBC Newsnight, Aliyah Hasinah explained how the UK has ‘had a longer time to marinate racism, to deeply entrench it through the use of scientific racism, eugenics, art, culture, business, politics, policies… In the same TV programme American actor Clark Peters talked about UK racism being ‘cloaked in beautiful language’.

Characterised by a dark blue palette of extraordinary depth & subtlety blue and white transferware was part of the ‘new media’ of its day… huge quantities of pictorial Staffordshire wares were exported to the US in early 19th century.… This platter is a perfect exemplar of the cloaking of racist history in ‘beautiful’ form… The original source of Enoch Wood’s transferware design was an engraving by John Hill (1806) after a painting by George Webster (1799), commissioned by HRH the Duke of Clarence as part of a campaign against abolitionists.. This platter was from a series of marine views made exclusively for US market.… In the original images both ships and castle flags were British, but Woods’ ‘slaver’ sails under Stars & Stripes.

READ MORE/VIEW PDF

EXHIBITIONS

ALL SOLO EXHIBITIONS

ALL GROUP EXHIBITIONS

CLAYSCAPES

CLAYSCAPES

Everson Museum of Art | Syracuse, NY
April 13 – October 20, 2024
Featuring Cristina CĂłrdova, Paul Scott, & Steven Young Lee

VIEW

VIDEOS

VIDEOS

Video: LSU LECTURE | “Cumbrian Blue(s): New American Scenery, Transferwares for the 21st Century” Sunday, November 16, 5:00 pm Paul Scott, ceramics artist, will give a Paula G. Manship Endowed Lecture to the College of Art & Design on Wednesday, November 16, 2022 at 5:00 p.m. in 103 Design Building Auditorium.

LECTURE | “Cumbrian Blue(s): New American Scenery, Transferwares for the 21st Century”

Sunday, November 16, 5:00 pm

Paul Scott, ceramics artist, was invited to speak through the Paula G. Manship Endowed Lecture Program at the College of Art & Design on Wednesday, November 16, 2022 at 5:00 p.m. in 103 Design Building Auditorium.

LEARN MORE

WATCH THE RECORDING OF THE LECTURE

HIDDEN IN PLAIN SIGHT: ILLUSTRATED CERAMICS AND AMERICAN IDENTITY

Panelists: Leslie Ferrin, Elizabeth Alexander, Jacqueline Bishop, Judy Chartrand, Niki Johnson, and Paul Scott.

Hidden in plain sight, illustrations on porcelain and ceramic ware have, throughout history, transformed functional objects into message-bearers for a wide range of political and propagandistic causes, whether exchanged by heads of state or acquired for use or display in domestic settings. Leslie Ferrin of Ferrin Contemporary will discuss the imagery, drawn from popular nineteenth-century prints, that was reproduced on widely distributed ceramics portraying historical events, indigenous people, and notable explorers, inventors, and politicians through a white European lens. The panel will explore how these seemingly ordinary objects, including Rockwell collector plates, have helped to establish firmly held beliefs about American identity. Artists Elizabeth Alexander, Jacqueline Bishop, Judy Chartrand, Niki Johnson, and Paul Scott, will discuss contemporary ceramics, which reject systems of racial oppression and invite reconsideration of the sanitized version of history that was presented for generations.

View Hidden in Plain Sight: Illustrated Ceramics and American Identity

TIMESTAMPS

0:00 Introduction to Symposium co-curators Stephanie Plunkett and Robyn Phillips Pendleton
23:00 Introduction
28:00 Leslie Ferrin Our America/Whose America? collection and exhibition
46:00 Jacqueline Bishop
52:00 Paul Scott
1:02:00 Elizabeth Alexander
1:11:00 Johnson
1:21:00 Judy Chartrand
1:37:00 Q&A

TIMESTAMPS
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PAUL SCOTT New American Scenery | Plate engraving with Paul Scott and Paul Holdway

October 13, 2021. Produced by The Bowes Museum. Ceramic artist Paul Scott tells us more about his collaboration with former SPODE engraver, Paul Holdway. Part of the New American Scenery Project.

View Plate engraving with Paul Scott and Paul Holdway

ARTIST TALK | MELTING POINT: RISING WATERS with Courtney M. Leonard, Paul Scott, and Norwood Viviano, moderated by Jami Powell

September 15, 2021. Ferrin Contemporary Curator Conversation featuring artists Courtney M. Leonard, Paul Scott, and Norwood Viviano. Moderated by Jami Powell, Ph.D., Curator of Indigenous Art, Hood Museum, Dartmouth University (Hanover, NH).

View Artist Talk | MELTING POINT: Rising Waters

FOUNDERS’ HOUR FEATURING Paul Scott with Leslie Ferrin & Brian Gallagher

June 11, 2021 | The Mint Museum’s Founders’ Circle is pleased to present their first ever International Founders’ Hour featuring UK-based artist, Paul Scott. From his studio in Cumbria, Scott creates contemporary versions of traditional blue and white transferware ceramics, updating this historic media for the 21st century. Scott’s work engages political and social issues that resonate with our lives today, questioning the cultural history of transferware ceramics in the dissemination of national ideas and settler-centric narratives.

View Founders’ Hour featuring Paul Scott with Leslie Ferrin & Brian Gallagher

FERRIN CONTEMPORARY IN CONVERSATION: RAID THE ICEBOX NOW with Elizabeth Williams, Beth Katleman, and Paul Scott

June 7, 2021 | For the 50th anniversary of Andy Warhol’s Raid the Icebox exhibition, RISD Museum invited eight contemporary artists and collectives to mine the museum, taking inspiration from objects or incorporating objects into new installations that reconsider how collections can be reimagined.

View Ferrin Contemporary in Conversation: Raid the Icebox Now with Elizabeth Williams, Beth Katleman, and Paul Scott

CATALOGS

CATALOGS

PAUL SCOTT & CAROLINE SLOTTE: One Way or Another | With essay by Glenn Adamson

PURCHASE THE CATALOG

Paul Scott | Cumbrian Blue(s), The Book

PAUL SCOTT: Ceramics and Print

HORIZON: Transferware and Contemporary Ceramics

PURCHASE THE CATALOG

‘Raid the Ice Box Now’ Digital Catalog

  • Produced by the Rhode Island School of Design Museum, 2019
  • To celebrate the 50th anniversary of its exhibition Raid the Icebox I with Andy Warhol, the RISD Museum is engaging contemporary artists and designers Pablo Bronstein, Nicole Eisenman, Pablo Helguera, Beth Katleman, Simone Leigh, Sebastian Ruth, Paul Scott, and Triple Canopy to create new bodies of work or create a unique curatorial project using the museum as a site for critical, creative production and presentation. Employing the galleries and digital platforms as well as spaces beyond the museum walls, these artists will question dominant narratives and highlight the strengths and idiosyncrasies of the museum’s collection, which includes more than 100,000 works spanning ancient times to the present. A landmark example of artist-curated museum exhibitions, Raid the Icebox I with Andy Warhol (1970) presented entire sections of objects as they appeared in storage, with little or no connoisseurial regard for their condition, authenticity, or art historical status. It remains one of the most celebrated and subversive exhibitions in contemporary art history.
  • Raid the Icebox Now is made possible by a lead grant from the National Endowment for the Arts with additional support from the RISD Museum Associates, Judy and Robert Mann, Taylor Box Company, and a generous in-kind gift from Meyer Sound Laboratories.

View ‘Raid the Ice Box Now’ Digital Catalog

PRESS & NEWS

SELECT PRESS & ARTIST NEWS

Paul Scott on Yale University Radio

Brainard Carey Interviews Paul Scott for Yale University Radio

WYBC, Yale University, January 23, 2026

Paul Scott (b. 1953, United Kingdom) is a UK-based artist, living and working in Cumbria, with a diverse practice and an international reputation. Creating individual pieces that blur the boundaries between fine art, craft, and design, he is well known for his research into printed vitreous surfaces, as well as his characteristic blue-and-white artworks in glazed ceramic.

LISTEN HERE

Something Old, Something New, Something Borrowed, Something Blue: Paul Scott’s Sampler Jug #10, Shelburne & Sugar

by Kory W. Rogers, Francie and John Downing Senior Curator of American Art, Shelburne Museum

The contemporary transferwares of British ceramic artist Paul Scott call to mind the old Victorian wedding rhyme: “Something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue.” In Scott’s case, the “old” is the eighteenthcentury technique of transfer printing on ceramics; the “new” is the imagery and incisive commentary on contemporary social and political issues that he weaves so deftly into his work; the “borrowed” refers to the historical patterns and borders he repurposes and reframes; and the “blue” is, quite literally, the cobalt pigment so closely associated with historic British transferwares popular with the American market. By blending the old with the new, the traditional with the inventive, and the serious with the playful, Scott’s work resonates deeply with Shelburne Museum’s curatorial ethos—making history relatable through the stories embedded in objects from the past and today alike.

VIEW ARTICLE

New CAM Exhibition Evaluates American Culture and History from an Outsider’s Perspective

Cincinnati Magazine October 2025

As its title suggests, Recall. Reframe. Respond. The Art of Paul Scott, the newest exhibition at the Cincinnati Art Museum, challenges visitors to rethink the way they view historical artworks and reflect on recent history shaping the U.S.

VIEW ARTICLE

Ceramic artist Paul Scott on his work and exhibitions

by Sue Allan, Cumbria Life September 2025

The most enjoyable thing I do, without doubt, is realising art works. The big jug I did last year for the Confected, Borrowed and Blue exhibition at the Shelburne Museum in Vermont was typical of what I do: researching a particular institution or collection and then creating a response to it. At the moment, there are two pieces in particular that I’m working on – two pieces for the Cincinnati which I still haven’t quite resolved. But I know what will happen: as soon as I start collaging, it will fall into place. In order to do that, I’ve done about a year’s worth of research, but I’ve learned that if I just follow the processes, eventually the old brain cells and ideas will catch up with it.

VIEW ARTICLE

Renowned British artist Paul Scott on view at Shelburne Museum

Art Daily July 2024
Shelburne Museum

SHELBURNE, VT. – Shelburne Museum presents the work of renowned British artist Paul Scott in the exhibition Confected, Borrowed & Blue: Transferware by Paul Scott that includes provocative reinterpretations of 19th-century transferware from Shelburne Museum’s permanent collection along with a work commissioned for the exhibition.

VIEW ARTICLE

Paul Scott’s Provocative Ceramics Reinvent Transferware Traditions

Seven Days June 19, 2024
Article by Pamela Polston 

A recently opened exhibition at Shelburne Museum, titled “Confected, Borrowed & Blue,” presents a selection of the internationally known British artist’s transferware updated for modern times.

VIEW ARTICLE

“Politics on a plate: how ceramics became a tool for satire and protest”

Financial Times March 15, 2024
Article by Malaika Byng

A new exhibition celebrates the ‘Trojan horse’ of the decorative arts

VIEW ARTICLE

“The magician’s trick”

Ceramics Now September/October 2022
Article by Ellen Bell

Ellen Bell reviews Paul Scott’s latest exhibition, a new collection of blue and white transferware that feture hard-hitting political messages on American history
“A mastercalss in blue and white transferware, Scott’s new collection is also a bravura performance in sleight of hand….For things are not as they seem…“

VIEW ARTICLE

“Traditional china serving up the big issues of today in pictures“

Blue and white transferware plates were hugely popular in the 19th century for their bucolic pastoral scenes. Over the past 30 years, artist Paul Scott, who lives in Cumbria, has updated the medium to address some very modern issues: the climate emergency, the refugee crisis, tensions in the Middle East.

VIEW ARTICLE

“On the Threshold: Paul Scott New American Scenery”

Essay by Jo Dahn

When he began to experiment with printing on ceramics Paul Scott soon found himself in liminal territory: his creative practice was becoming unclassifiable. ‘In those days’, he has said, ‘there was no-one around me who was doing anything remotely similar, but that’s a double-edged sword: it launches you into a no-man’s-land, because you’re not a painter or a fine art printmaker and you’re not a potter or a craftsperson … In a way I enjoyed it immensely because I was doing things that people hadn’t seen before.’

VIEW ARTICLE

 “Exhibition | ‘Home Truths,’ Paul Scott’s Brutal Blue and White Porcelain Plates”

Cfile.Capsule

Re-purposing these cultural artifacts in such a way as to offer new narrative interpretations that encourage re-examination. Drawing from his encyclopedic knowledge of and fascination with the material, he alters, erases and adds new images to the intricately detailed scenes and patterns of these domestic items, whereby the imagery is ruptured and recalibrated for a contemporary world. Scott’s interventions enable him to explore a range of issues from ecology to the refugee crisis.

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“Paul Scott’s Confected Landscapes and Contemporary Vignettes”

Essay by Amy Gogarty

The work disccussed in this article relates to reasearch conducted during the course of his PhD, yet it embodies themes that have preoccupied him for some time. These include theories of picturesque landscape painting; the remediation and circulation in print form of such painting; domestic ceramic objects printed with landscape imagery and a host of contemporary issues concerning relationships between human civilization and the natural world.

VIEW ARTICLE

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12
May
2017
BOBBY SILVERMAN

BOBBY SILVERMAN

ARTWORK

ARTWORKS & INSTALLATIONS

NEW WORK

VASE FORMS

Bobby Silverman, “Untitled Pill Form (Black over Yellow)”, 2022, porcelain, glaze, glass, 13.25 x 5.5″
Bobby, Silverman, “Untitled Pill Form (Black over Red)”, 2022, porcelain, glaze, 12.75 x 5.5″
Bobby Silverman, “Untitled Pill Form (Black over Grey)” 2022, porcelain, glaze, 12.75 x 5.5″
Bobby, Silverman, “Untitled Pill Form (Chrome over White)”, 2022, porcelain, glaze, chrome, 12.75 x 5.5″
Bobby, Silverman, “Untitled Pill Form (Black over Red)”, 2022, porcelain, glaze, 12.75 x 5.5″
Bobby Silverman, “Untitled Pill Form (Black over Yellow)”, 2022, porcelain, glaze, glass, 13.25 x 5.5″
Bobby Silverman, “Untitled Pill Form (Black over Grey)” 2022, porcelain, glaze, 12.75 x 5.5″
Bobby, Silverman, “Untitled Pill Form (Chrome over White)”, 2022, porcelain, glaze, chrome, 12.75 x 5.5″

VASE TILE SETS

Bobby Silverman, “Untitled Vase Short with Tile (Tie Dye)”, 2022, porcelain, glaze, 9.25 x 8″
Bobby Silverman, “Untitled Vase Short with Tile (Tie Dye)”, 2022, view 2, porcelain, glaze, 9.25 x 8″
Bobby Silverman, “Untitled Vase Round with Tile (White over Black)”, 2022, porcelain, glaze, tile, 10.5 x 11.75″ (with tile)
Bobby Silverman, “Untitled Vase Round with Tile (White over Black)”, view 2, 2022, porcelain, glaze, tile, 10.5 x 11.75″ (with tile)
Bobby Silverman, “Untitled Vase Round with Tile (Orange over Black)”, 2022, porcelain, glaze, tile,11.75 x 10″ (with tile)
Bobby Silverman, “Untitled Vase Round with Tile (Orange over Black)”, view 2, 2022, porcelain, glaze, tile,11.75 x 10″ (with tile)

ABOUT

BOBBY SILVERMAN

Bobby Silverman, Artist Portrait, 2022. Photo by Nate Bozeman

FOR MORE

BOBBYSILVERMAN.COM

CV

BIO

STATEMENT

ABOUT

American, b. 1956, Port Jefferson, NY
works in Brooklyn, NY

Bobby Silverman is an American artist known for his contemporary design in ceramics. Silverman balances material, process, and idea in a strong, unified whole. In his materials, he brings together pieces with international origins: large-format tiles that originated in China and glazes from England and the Netherlands. Silverman’s technically demanding process combines complex glazing and multi-firing methods that unite the materials in a way that supports and conveys his underlying concepts. These ideas are presented through words, letterforms, coded symbols, color, and texture. His work explores influences from Cuneiform tablets, Arabic calligraphy, Braille, the Ancient Greek poems of Sappho, and the writings of French philosopher Maurice Merleau-Ponty.

Silverman has received fellowships from the Louisiana State Council for the Arts, National Endowment for the Arts, the New York State Council for the Arts, and the Southern Arts Federation/National Endowment of the Arts Fellowship. Silverman has exhibited internationally and his work is held in many private and public collections including the Museum of Arts and Design (New York, NY), the European Ceramic Workcenter (Oisterwijk, Netherlands), The Museum of Fine Arts (New York, NY), and the Renwick Gallery of The Smithsonian American Art Museum (Washington, D.C.).

Silverman earned his MFA from the New York State College of Ceramics at Alfred University, his BFA from the Kansas City Art Institute, and his BA in Social Geography from Clark University Worcester. Silverman has taught and lectured in China, the U.S., Europe, and the Middle East. He is currently the Director of the Ceramics Center at the 92nd St. Y in New York City.

ON HIS WORK

My work explores the idiosyncratic nature of ceramic material and its ability to express phenomenological properties including luminosity, translucency, gravity, and reflection. I am primarily interested in how the ceramic surface relates to ideas about abstraction or natural phenomena such as how the static can be made fluid or how a physical surface can seem to have infinite depth. My work develops from the outside in—the surface quality is paramount and the form is chosen to highlight that surface. Most recently, I have begun to add other materials to the mix: cast resin, glass, and automotive paint are used as static counterpoints to the glaze and to extend my conversation about the inherent quality of different materials.

The phenomenological and the material are two of my top studio concerns, yet they are also in service to my primary goal: communication. Material communicates, of course, but often I use literal forms of communication to develop a surface. Cuneiform tablets, Arabic calligraphy, Braille, the Ancient Greek poems of Sappho, and the writings of French philosopher Maurice Merleau-Ponty all influence or appear directly in my work.

Robert Silverman, “Untitled Triptych” 2014, re-fired commercial tile fabricated in Jingdezhen, China, 36 x 28 x 1.5″ (each).

ON HIS TILE WORK

Bobby Silverman’s brilliantly-glazed, large-scale porcelain tiles begin as raw clay in China, where ceramic tradition dates back hundreds of years. Working with expert craftsman, Silverman designed a paper-thin flat tile up to 43 x 33”, which is in itself a technical achievement. The blank tile is fabricated in Jingdezhen, China, fired to a high temperature, crated, and shipped to his studio in the United States. Silverman then masterfully glazes the porcelain and fires it numerous times in his kiln to create a visual language of pure color, vivid striping, or abstract text using Morse code or braille. Because Silverman makes his masterful understanding of the chemistry of ceramics look effortless, the viewer sees a pristine, vibrant work of art that is reminiscent of color field painting, but resonates with a color and light that only glaze can achieve.

EXHIBITIONS

CURRENT + RECENT EXHIBITIONS

BOBBY SILVERMAN: NEW WORK

2022 | Ferrin Contemporary | North Adams, MA

As an object maker, my primary focus has always been on materials and process. My work starts from the surface and the form follows suit. I throw forms that best articulate the unusual palette of glazes and surface finishes that I continually develop. By using a variety of materials, firing temperatures with repeat firings, and many layers of glaze, I have developed my own unique surface language.

Recently, I began adding other materials to the mix including cast resin, glass, chrome, and automotive paint. These additional materials possess their own specific properties that complement and illuminate ceramic surfaces. This approach allows me to investigate the idiosyncratic nature of ceramic materials and its phenomenological properties such as luminosity, translucency, gravity, and reflection.

— Bobby Silverman

MELTING POINT & ARTIST FEATURE

2021 Group Exhibition | Ferrin Contemporary | North Adams, MA & Heller Gallery | New York, NY

Solo Feature | The Porches Inn | North Adams, MA

Robert Silverman, "Untitled Tile - Orange over blue", 2013, re-fired commercial porcelain tile, 36 x 28 x 1.5"
Robert Silverman, “Untitled Tile – Orange over blue”, 2013, re-fired commercial porcelain tile, 36 x 28 x 1.5″
"Melting Point" Installation view with Robert Silverman at Heller Gallery 2021
“Melting Point” Installation view with Robert Silverman at Heller Gallery 2021
Bobby Silverman, "Untitled Triptych", 2014, re-fired commercial porcelain tile, 120 x 28 x 1.5"
Bobby Silverman, “Untitled Triptych”, 2014, re-fired commercial porcelain tile, 120 x 28 x 1.5″

VASES

Robert Silverman, "Untitled Vase", 2021, glazed porcelain, automotive paint, 9 x 9 x 9".
Robert Silverman, “Untitled Vase”, 2021, glazed porcelain, automotive paint, 9 x 9 x 9″.
Robert Silverman, "Vase (8)", 2021, glazed porcelain, 9.5 x 8.5 x 8.5"
Robert Silverman, “Vase (8)”, 2021, glazed porcelain, 9.5 x 8.5 x 8.5″
Robert Silverman, "Untitled Vase - Yellow Coral", 2020, glazed porcelain, automotive paint, 12.75 x 6.25 x 6.25"
Robert Silverman, “Untitled Vase – Yellow Coral”, 2020, glazed porcelain, automotive paint, 12.75 x 6.25 x 6.25″
Robert Silverman, "Vase (6)", 2021, glazed porcelain, 13.5 x 6 x 6"
Robert Silverman, “Vase (6)”, 2021, glazed porcelain, 13.5 x 6 x 6″
Robert Silverman, "Untitled Vase", 2021, glazed porcelain, automotive paint, 8 x 8.5 x 8.5"
Robert Silverman, “Untitled Vase”, 2021, glazed porcelain, automotive paint, 8 x 8.5 x 8.5″

TILES

Bobby Silverman "Untitled Tile - Yellow 1", 2013, Re-fired commercial tile fabricated in Jingdezhen, China, 12 x 12 x .5"
Bobby Silverman “Untitled Tile – Yellow 1″, 2013, Re-fired commercial tile fabricated in Jingdezhen, China, 12 x 12 x .5”
Bobby Silverman "Untitled Tile - Red Binary Code", 2013, Re-fired commercial tile fabricated in Jingdezhen, China, 12 x 12 x .5"
Bobby Silverman “Untitled Tile – Red Binary Code”, 2013, Re-fired commercial tile fabricated in Jingdezhen, China, 12 x 12 x .5″
Bobby Silverman "Wilde", 2014, Re-fired commercial tile fabricated in Jingdezhen, China, 35 x 27.5 x .5"
Bobby Silverman “Wilde”, 2014, Re-fired commercial tile fabricated in Jingdezhen, China, 35 x 27.5 x .5″
Bobby Silverman "Untitled Tile - Blue Bar Code", 2013, Re-fired commercial tile fabricated in Jingdezhen, China, 12 x 12 x .5"
Bobby Silverman “Untitled Tile – Blue Bar Code”, 2013, Re-fired commercial tile fabricated in Jingdezhen, China, 12 x 12 x .5″
Bobby Silverman "Untitled Tile - Red Bar Code", 2013, Re-fired commercial tile fabricated in Jingdezhen, China, 12 x 12 x .5"
Bobby Silverman “Untitled Tile – Red Bar Code”, 2013, Re-fired commercial tile fabricated in Jingdezhen, China, 12 x 12 x .5″

BOWLS

Bobby Silverman, "Untitled Bowl (Tie Dye)", 2021, glazed porcelain, automotive paint, 13 x 13 x 2.5"
Bobby Silverman, “Untitled Bowl (Tie Dye)”, 2021, glazed porcelain, automotive paint, 13 x 13 x 2.5″
Bobby Silverman, "Untitled Bowl (Aqua)", 2021, glazed porcelain, automotive paint, 14 x 14 x 3.5"
Bobby Silverman, “Untitled Bowl (Aqua)”, 2021, glazed porcelain, automotive paint, 14 x 14 x 3.5″
Bobby Silverman, "Untitled Bowl (Black & Tie Dye)", 2021, glazed porcelain, 13 x 13 x 2.5"
Bobby Silverman, “Untitled Bowl (Black & Tie Dye)”, 2021, glazed porcelain, 13 x 13 x 2.5″
Bobby Silverman, "Untitled Bowl (Purple)", 2021, glazed porcelain, automotive paint, 10.5 x 10.5 x 2.25"
Bobby Silverman, “Untitled Bowl (Purple)”, 2021, glazed porcelain, automotive paint, 10.5 x 10.5 x 2.25″
Bobby Silverman, "Untitled Bowl (Black & Tie Dye)", 2021, glazed porcelain, automotive paint, 13 x 13 x 2.5"
Bobby Silverman, “Untitled Bowl (Black & Tie Dye)”, 2021, glazed porcelain, automotive paint, 13 x 13 x 2.5″

F(E)FF (EVERSON)

2016 Installation | Featured in the Everson Biennial | Everson Museum of Art | Syracuse, NY

Robert Silverman, "f(e)ff (Everson)" 2016, porcelain, wallpaper, photographs, aluminum, pins, tap, 22 x 7'.
Robert Silverman, “f(e)ff (Everson)” 2016, porcelain, wallpaper, photographs, aluminum, pins, tap, 22 x 7′.
Robert Silverman, "f(e)ff (Everson)" 2016, porcelain, wallpaper, photographs, aluminum, pins, tap, 22 x 7'.
Robert Silverman, “f(e)ff (Everson)” 2016, porcelain, wallpaper, photographs, aluminum, pins, tap, 22 x 7′.
Robert Silverman, "f(e)ff (Everson)" 2016, porcelain, wallpaper, photographs, aluminum, pins, tap, 22 x 7'.
Robert Silverman, “f(e)ff (Everson)” 2016, porcelain, wallpaper, photographs, aluminum, pins, tap, 22 x 7′.

ON ONE OF HIS INFLUENCES

We know not through our intellect but through our experience. ― Maurice Merleau-Ponty

Unlike other philosophers, Merleau-Ponty emphasized the body as well as the mind as a gateway to understanding the world. His belief that the body and that which it perceived could not be separated seems perfectly suited to the perceptual and haptic sensibilities of fired clay.
I was initially trained as a social geographer and later as an artist. Acknowledging this early training and reflecting the mind-body understanding, my current work connects the way in which we both visualize information and viscerally experience this process of perception.

TIRANA

2015 Installation | Featured in GLAZED & DIFFUSED | Group Exhibition | Ferrin Contemporary | North Adams, MA

Robert Silverman, "Tirana (inspired by Rana) 2015, 15 x 10'.
Robert Silverman, “Tirana (inspired by Rana) 2015, 15 x 10′.
Robert Silverman, "Tirana (inspired by Rana) detail, 2015, 15 x 10'.
Robert Silverman, “Tirana (inspired by Rana) detail, 2015, 15 x 10′.
Robert Silverman, "Tirana (inspired by Rana) detail, 2015, 15 x 10'.
Robert Silverman, “Tirana (inspired by Rana) detail, 2015, 15 x 10′.
Robert Silverman, "Tirana (inspired by Rana) detail, 2015, 15 x 10'.
Robert Silverman, “Tirana (inspired by Rana) detail, 2015, 15 x 10′.

ON TIRANA

In October 2000, artist Eddie Rama became the Mayor of Tirana, Albania. At that time the capital city was a downtrodden remnant of the Soviet Union. The city budget was squandered, corruption was rampant and crime was the norm. But Rama had an idea to raise the spirits of his town — he painted many of the grey buildings loud colors and bold designs.
When the colored buildings began to multiply, a mood of change started to transform the spirit of the people. There was less litter in the streets, people started to pay taxes. As Rama said “Beauty was giving people a feeling of being protected. This was not a misplaced feeling — crime did fall.”
Inspired by Rama’s vision, I use everyday commercial tile and glaze materials to create surfaces and imagery that blur the traditional lines drawn between art, design and architecture. In doing this I hope to elevate everyday materials and give them meaning beyond their manufactured intent.

CURRENT + RECENT

INQUIRE

INQUIRE

Additional works may be available to acquire, but not listed here.

If interested in lists of all works and series: Send us a message

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12
May
2017
MARA SUPERIOR

MARA SUPERIOR

ARTWORK

ARTWORKS & SERIES

POLITICAL/HISTORICAL

View More on Superior’s Political & Historical Series

“Artists can actualize tangible objects which address the frustrations that we commonly feel. In ceramics, there is a long, historic tradition of political commentary. Themes that pique our visual outcries range from canaries in the coal mine to thinking about citizenship, American and world history, power, democracy and the value and vulnerability of freedom. Since the invention of the printing press, drawings of political satire and humor have been used to inform and get a message out to the population. 17th and 18th century British and French political satire, as well as comic art and prints by James Gilroy and William Hogarth changed thinking with brilliant wit equaling high art. Goya, Daumier, Picasso, the Gorilla Girls, and today’s New Yorker Magazine covers by Barry Blit come to mind as artists make political-commentary in reaction to their times.”

— Mara Superior

The Pursuit of Happiness


Mara Superior
“The Pursuit of Happiness”
2012-2014
high-fired porcelain, ceramic oxides, underglaze, glaze, glaze, wood, gold leaf, brass, bone, paper
27.5 x 25 x 20″

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Democracy/Come Together/Mend/Repair

“A forever optimist, I remain hopeful that the majority of Americans will be able to sort through the semantics, scrambling of the truth and reality and make common sense political decisions, spread the word, and use their privilege to vote

This piece is a visual representation of a divided democracy, literally being sewn back together with golden thread, an ancient Japanese Kintsugi Gold leaf repair, and porcelain buttons, in hopes of keeping it together.”

READ MORE/ VIEW PDF


Mara Superior
“Democracy/Come Together/Mend/Repair, Tiny America Bill Board/Vote 4 Democracy 2024/Abe Lincoln” (grouping)
2024
high fired English porcelain, ceramic underglaze and oxides, Cornwall stone glaze
20.5 x 7.75 x 1.25” (plate), 3.5 x 4.5 x 2″ (bill board); 3.75 x 2 x 2” (Lincoln)

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I Want to Go Home!/Lady Liberty

“The “Statue of Liberty”, (officially named, “Liberty Enlightening the World) is an inspiring globally recognized iconic monument symbolizing the United States. She arrived in the New York Harbor in 1886. A gift from France commemorating the centennial of the United States Declaration of Independence.

Lady Liberty symbolizes the ideals of liberty, human rights, abolition of slavery, democracy, hope, and opportunity. She welcomes visitors, immigrants, and returning Americans traveling by ship.

Frederic Bartholdi sculpted the colossal statue based on the Greek goddess of liberty, Eleutheria, who had a temple on the Avertine Hill in Rome since c. 238 B.C.

My depiction of Lady Liberty who has been hit by lightning, thousands of times is ready to go back to her beloved homeland, La Belle, France!”

READ MORE/ VIEW PDF


Mara Superior
“I Want to Go Home!/Lady Liberty”
2024
high fired English porcelain, ceramic underglaze and oxides, Cornwall stone glaze, gold leaf
9.5 x 6.5 x 1.25″

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2020/USA/Vote/America


Mara Superior
“2020/USA/Vote/America”
2019
high-fired porcelain, ceramic oxides, underglaze, glaze, ceramic decals, gold leaf
13 x 16.25 x 2”

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Who is in Charge, America?


Mara Superior
“Who is in Charge, America?”
2019
high-fired porcelain, ceramic oxides, underglaze, glaze, overglaze enamel, gold leaf
6.5 x 9.5 x 1”.

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Presidential Cups


Mara Superior
“Presidential Cups”, set of 3
2010-2023
high-fired porcelain, ceramic oxides, underglaze, glaze
15 x 25 x 7.5″ (set); 4.5 x 7.25 x 2.5″ (cup)

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ART HISTORY

View More on Superior’s Art History Series

Mara Superior’s passion for Art History and the History of the Decorative Arts has informed her work throughout her career. She seeks to create beauty through the reinterpretation of historical inspirations synthesized with her own visual vocabulary and contemporary views. The idiosyncratic visual language that Superior has been cultivating over decades is largely rooted in porcelain but encompasses painting, art history, ceramic history, and contemporary art. Works in this series juxtapose art historical references beginning with the Egyptians through 17th-century European ceramics from a contemporary viewpoint. The resulting objects are rooted in the historical continuum.

The Nymph of Spring (After Lucas Cranach)


Mara Superior
“The Nymph of Spring (After Lucas Cranach)”
2021
high-fired porcelain, ceramic oxides and underglazes, gold leaf, epoxy, digital print
12.5 x 18.5 x 1.5”

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Teapot of Survival (Portland Vase)

Mara Superior, "Teapot of Survival (Portland Vase)", 2023, high-fired English porcelain, painted with ceramic underglazes, ground oxides, Cornwallstone glaze, wood, gold, leaf, bone and ink, 19 x 14.5 x 6.5", John Polak Photography
Mara Superior, "Teapot of Survival (Portland Vase)", 2023, high-fired English porcelain, painted with ceramic underglazes, ground oxides, Cornwallstone glaze, wood, gold, leaf, bone and ink, 19 x 14.5 x 6.5", John Polak Photography
Mara Superior, "Teapot of Survival (Portland Vase)", 2023, high-fired English porcelain, painted with ceramic underglazes, ground oxides, Cornwallstone glaze, wood, gold, leaf, bone and ink, 19 x 14.5 x 6.5", John Polak Photography

Mara Superior
“Teapot of Survival (Portland Vase)”
2023
high-fired English porcelain, painted with ceramic underglazes, ground oxides, Cornwallstone glaze, wood, gold, leaf, bone and ink.
19 x 14.5 x 6.5″

“The Teapot of Survival”, is about an objects history, differences between eastern and western philosophies regarding restoration to perfection or emphasizing imperfections, and acceptance of the fact that the object is worthy of existence, letting the viewer experience the realities of what it’s been through.

I constructed this piece as a Commemorative British sculptural teapot. After the first bisque fire, I noticed that the piece had firing cracks. It sat on my studio shelf for years until the idea came to me that I would work with the ideas of perfection and restoration.

My intention changed, and I decorated the piece with references to its imperfection. I have Shakespeare remarking “Much A do!”, the queen, stating that it’s “A Royal Mess!”~ I will “Kintsugi”, the cracks with plaster and gold leaf.

It sits on a wooden gold leafed base.

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Birth of Venus (After Sandro Botticelli)


Mara Superior
“Birth of Venus (After Sandro Botticelli)”
2021
high-fired porcelain, ceramic oxides and underglazes, gold leaf, epoxy, digital print
17.5 x 14 x 2”.

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ENVIRONMENTAL

View More on Superior’s Environmental Series

“My piece in Ferrin Contemporary’s exhibition Nature/Nurture, Only One Planet Earth, is a commentary on the current predicament mankind is facing — Climate Change — and what to do about it. I can only hope that this universally shared crisis will bring out the best in us and bring humanity together to find remedies.”

— Mara Superior, 2020

Only One Planet Earth


Mara Superior
“Only One Planet Earth”
2019
high-fired porcelain, ceramic oxides, underglaze, glaze, gold leaf
16 x 16 x 1.5”

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Le Do Do


Mara Superior
“Le DoDo”
2019
high-fired porcelain, ceramic oxides, underglaze, glaze
16 x 16 x 2″.

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Polar Distress


Mara Superior
“Polar Distress”
2021
high-fired porcelain, ceramic oxides, underglaze, glaze
16 x 16 x 2.5”.

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The Ice is Melting, (Five-finger Vase)


Mara Superior
“The Ice is Melting, (Five-finger Vase)”
2022
high-fired porcelain, ceramic oxides, underglaze, glaze
9.25 x 9 x 5.25″

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HOUSE & GARDEN

View More on Superior’s House & Garden Series

Mara Superior’s House & Garden Series highlights the landscape, architecture, and lifestyle of New England. The artworks display the depth of influence that living in the area has had on the artist’s aesthetic, and range from teapots, to relief tiles and platters.

Our House

Mara Superior, "Our House", 2023, high-fired porcelain, ceramic oxides, underglaze, glaze, 14kt gold leaf, 16 x 16 x 2.25".
Mara Superior, "Our House", 2023, high-fired porcelain, ceramic oxides, underglaze, glaze, 14kt gold leaf, 16 x 16 x 2.25".

Mara Superior
“Our House”
2023
high-fired porcelain, ceramic oxides, underglaze, glaze, 14kt gold leaf
16 x 16 x 2.25″.

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Summer House (June Platter)


Mara Superior
“Summer House (June Platter)”
2022
high-fired porcelain, ceramic oxides, underglaze, glaze
14.5 x 18 x 1.5”.

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Watching the Sea (A Dream Platter)


Mara Superior
“Watching the Sea (A Dream Platter)”
2022
high-fired porcelain, ceramic oxides, underglaze, glaze
14.5 x 18 x 1.5″

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My Winter House (A Dream House)

Mara Superior, "My Winter House (A Dream House)", 2020, English porcelain, cobalt oxide, gold luster, glaze, 14.5 x 18 x 1.5"
Mara Superior, "My Winter House (A Dream House)", 2020, English porcelain, cobalt oxide, gold luster, glaze, 14.5 x 18 x 1.5"

Mara Superior
“My Winter House (A Dream House)”
2020
English porcelain, cobalt oxide, gold luster, glaze
14.5 x 18 x 1.5”.

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A Dream House Dreaming


Mara Superior
“A Dream House Dreaming”
1984
high-fired porcelain, ceramic oxides, underglaze, glaze
15.25 x 13.25 x 5″

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Largest Heart Platter


Mara Superior
“Largest Heart Platter”
1989
high-fired porcelain, ceramic oxides, underglaze, glaze
20 x 19.5 x 1.5″.

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My Lobster


Mara Superior
“My Lobster”
2019
high-fired porcelain, ceramic oxides, underglaze, glaze, overglaze enamel
16.5 x 16.5 x 1.5”.

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BLUE PERIOD

View More on Mara Superior’s Blue Series

In Superior’s Blue Series, she highlights the cobalt blue and white ceramic tradition that began in China and was the inspiration and foundation of porcelain work in Europe and across the globe. Some of her Blue Series pieces use the classic visual themes and icons of early Chinese blue and white export porcelain, such as waterscapes, pagodas, mountains, and bridges. In other pieces, she uses the cobalt blue and white palette to paint western scenes similar to those found in her multicolored work. Every time she uses cobalt blue, she connects a dot back to the Chinese blue and white tradition and positions herself as a continuation of that tradition in the history of porcelain.

Let the Sun Shine on Moi

Mara Superior, "Let the Sun Shine on Moi", 2022, English porcelain, cobalt oxide, gold luster, glaze, 11 x 14.25 x .5"
Mara Superior, "Let the Sun Shine on Moi", 2022, English porcelain, cobalt oxide, gold luster, glaze, 11 x 14.25 x .5"

Mara Superior
“Let the Sun Shine on Moi”
2022
English porcelain, cobalt oxide, gold luster, glaze
11 x 14.25 x .5″.

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ABOUT

MARA SUPERIOR

MARASUPERIOR.COM

CV

BIO

ABOUT

American, b. 1951, New York, NY
lives and works in Williamsburg, MA

Mara Superior is an American visual artist who works in porcelain. Her ceramic high relief platters and sculptural objects reflect the artist’s passion for art history and the decorative arts, and her painterly motifs range from the pleasures of the domestic to serious political and environmental issues as points of departure to comment on contemporary culture and its relationship to history. Superior has received numerous awards including a National Endowment for the Visual Arts Fellowship, the prestigious Guldaggergård Residency in Denmark, and numerous individual artist grants from the Massachusetts Cultural Council.

Superior has exhibited at the American Museum of Ceramic Art, (Pomona, CA), Scripps Women’s College, (Claremont, CA), and the Fuller Craft Museum, (Brockton, MA) among many other institutions. Her work can be found in the Renwick Gallery of the Smithsonian American Art Museum, (Washington, DC), the Museum of Arts and Design, (New York, NY), the Peabody Essex Museum, (Salem, MA), Philadelphia Museum of Art, (Philadelphia, PA) the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, (Los Angeles, CA), White House Collection of American Craft, (Little Rock, AK). In 2018, through the generous support of the Kohler Foundation, gifts of art by Mara Superior were made to fifteen museums throughout the USA, increasing the public holdings of Superior’s artworks  and including an in depth collection acquired by the Racine Art Museum, (Racine, WI) and shown in 2020 in Collection Focus: Mara Superior. In 2010 she was interviewed for the oral history program of the Smithsonian’s Archives of American Art, (Washington, DC).

Superior studied at the Pratt Institute and Hartford Art School, completing her BFA in painting from the University of Connecticut followed by a MAT in ceramics from the University of Massachusetts in Amherst. She is represented by Ferrin Contemporary.

Portrait of the Artist with ”The Nymph of Spring (After Lucas Cranach)”, 2021,
high-fired porcelain, ceramic oxides and underglazes, gold leaf, epoxy, digital print, 12.5 x 18.5 x 1.5″.
Photo by John Polak Photography

STATEMENTS FROM THE ARTIST

ON ART HISTORY

“My passion for Art History and the History of the Decorative Arts has informed my work throughout my career. I seek to create beauty through the reinterpretation of historical inspirations synthesized with my own visual vocabulary and contemporary views. The resulting objects are rooted in the historical continuum.”

ON HER PAINTING BACKGROUND

“At 26 years old, I came to porcelain and brought to this new material all of the tools and accumulated knowledge from my background, education, and experiences to date. My undergraduate background in painting shaped who I am as an artist—the way I see and think visually and conceptually. I approached ceramics from a two-dimensional point of view, with platters being canvases.

I was attracted to porcelain as a painting surface. My preference for slab building, akin to 3- dimensional construction paper, is because it is a flat, smooth painting surface. I came with content and imagery in mind. I explored strong shapes and construction methods, and I settled on a boxy construction format which could accommodate curves. I explored flattening iconic ceramic vase and teapot forms. Form and surface were coming together for me, and then I had a new element to work with—texture! Stamping sprigs and modeling were incorporated into the designs.

First, I always make sketches of ideas in sketchbooks. I begin by drawing shapes on paper of objects that I wanted to try to build in porcelain. When the shape is perfected, my sewing skills come into play with pattern making for porcelain constructions. I make vellum patterns and trace them onto leather hard slabs of clay, cut out the parts, and assemble the sculpture.

I went back to school specifically to study ceramics after a five-year interim period. It was a tiny department of two professors, but since my roots were already in place, I wasn’t able to take off and select the best ceramic program in the nation. I had to make do. It all worked out in the end.”

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ON PORCELAIN

“With porcelain, the material comes with a world of historical context of its own. I’m interested in working with a clay body with a history attached to it—either porcelain or terracotta. When I’m holding porcelain in my hand, I feel like I have a 1600-year-old continuing link to the original Chinese porcelains that were developed around 400 A.D. The material and firing method that I have selected—high fired porcelain in a reduction fired kiln—refer back to this ancient history and are comparable to what was produced in 400 A.D. I am on that continuing timeline, and that’s part of the thrill and excitement of working with porcelain.

As I’ve said, there are lots of problems with this material, but I knew from the start that this is what I wanted. I got stuck on this particular material and firing method because I saw it from its historical vantage point and because maybe my visual acuity is more discriminating than most. Other people might not be able to distinguish between a lower fire soft paste porcelain, which I see as warm and pasty, and the depth of this glassy porcelain that I use. This material excites me to this day.

I don’t know anyone that has done what I have done with these exact materials. It’s not because I’m stupid—it’s because I’m stubborn. I do know what is possible and I’m always after what is in my mind’s eye. When I’m working, I’m seeing the best firing. I’m seeing the copper doing its thing. Sometimes I’m disappointed, because that’s a whole other world of things, working on something for months and then putting it in a kiln with unexpected results. Even though you’re trying your best to control the atmosphere, unexpected things might happen during the kiln firing. It’s a tremendously high-risk material, and I guess I have the patience for it. Creative energy is creative energy, and it can be channeled into anything, any material.

When I was younger, I experimented with many materials, and sometimes I would work with a few materials at the same time. But I came to recognize that I had to choose one, and it seemed to come down to what I had the patience for. I discovered this porcelain by chance, and that was it. I just loved it at first sight, and I was sticking with it.”

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ON HER AESTHETIC

“My work is autobiographical. Whatever is at the top of my mind can find its way into my work. It’s a visual diary of my “One Life Story”. Ultimately, my work is about humanity and about being alive as a human being in my time. It’s the life story of my voice in porcelain.

Upon encountering the American minimalist artist Robert Ryman, best known for his monochromatic white canvas paintings made during the mid-1970s and early 80s, art critics of the day wrote in Art Forum magazine that “Painting is Dead”. I thought that this could not possibly be true! There would always have to be room for what I termed as “personalism”, as a human artistic expression. I think that this closely relates to the currently popular “identity”- based painting.

During this time, the fine art world was quite hostile towards object makers, and the craft world was all embracing. It was a kinder, gentler community of individuals (though of course, less intellectually brilliant in the hierarchical order of things in the art world). Many artists crossed over at this time, and the craft world inherited “object makers” because they were celebrated.

My work has always been celebratory, commemorative, idealistic, uplifting, and beautiful. That hasn’t changed over the years, whether I’m working with romantic or controversial political subject matter. From the start, I set out to make beautiful objects with their “messages” to send out to the world, and I’ve done that. They are precious objects, meant for the joy of observation and calling out for ceremonial placement in the environment. They were never really intended to be utilitarian, although, of course, I use my pieces. I have great esteem for functional potters, who must use very practical considerations—ergonomics, how objects work and feel in the hand and on the lips, the weight and balance of things—as well as good design.

A few of the subjects that have inspired me over the years are the history of porcelain and ceramics; history, art history, and mythology; mates for life, romance, big love, and pairs; house, garden, and all things domestic; botanicals and still life; feminism, female icons, and the domestic goddess; food and the history of food; farm animals, pets, and wildlife; love letters to New England architecture, landscape, and sense of place; the sea, fantasy, and aqua vitae (“water of life”); travels, souvenirs, Europe, and museums; music and books; political commentary; the environment; and collections. Now that Biden is in office, I feel that I can get back to my own artistic content—for two years, anyway. There are endless topics of inspiration. I have sketchbooks filled with ideas for things that I haven’t made yet. At this point I don’t think about it—I just do it.”

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ON HER CAREER

“I was nurtured and encouraged to develop my imagination by my family and art teachers all the way through graduate school. Further enrichment came by way of my extraordinary good fortune to have been married to Roy Superior, a wonderful Artist and Professor of Art. Over the course of my career, ceramics, art schools, museum curators and society have evolved to become more inclusive. Barriers have disintegrated, and currently, it feels as if ceramics is female-empowered given that so many of the magazine editors, gallerists and many curators are women. For my entire professional career, I have been blessed to have only one brilliant and visionary female art dealer, Leslie Ferrin, of Ferrin Contemporary. Leslie has always encouraged my best work, offered me opportunities, and given me valued professional advice. The choices that I employ regarding my own work for materials, content, palette and ornament might, by historical standards, be considered feminine work by nature. That label has never been a hindrance to me. I have had a very privileged life and career as an artist and am grateful for it all.”

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Mara Superior, ”The Nymph of Spring (After Lucas Cranach)”, 2021, high-fired porcelain, ceramic oxides and underglazes, gold leaf, epoxy, digital print, 12.5 x 18.5 x 1.5″.

Mara Superior: Chronicling our Collective Hopes
By Lauren Levato Coyne, MFA, artist & writer

Superior’s works often reference the Renaissance, though she herself is akin to a medieval chronicler, a documentarian using stylized drawings (or sculptures in Superior’s case) and fanciful flourishes with a personalized spin to relay current events in an approachable manner. Superior’s high-relief porcelain works directly engage with our current socio-political moments while retaining hope for our collective future. Her whimsical storytelling pulls the threads of shared cultural histories in an attempt to activate our better angels.”

CLICK TO VIEW HEY! CERAMIQUE.S CATALOG, FEATURING THE FULL ARTICLE

Mara Superior, "Let the Sun Shine on Moi", 2022, English porcelain, cobalt oxide, gold luster, glaze, 11 x 14.25 x .5"

Mara Superior, “Let the Sun Shine on Moi”, 2022, English porcelain, cobalt oxide, gold luster, glaze, 11 x 14.25 x .5″

ON HER BLUE SERIES

In Superior’s Blue Series, she highlights the cobalt blue and white ceramic tradition that began in China and was the inspiration and foundation of porcelain work in Europe and across the globe. Some of her Blue Series pieces use the classic visual themes and icons of early Chinese blue and white export porcelain, such as waterscapes, pagodas, mountains, and bridges. In other pieces, she uses the cobalt blue and white palette to paint western scenes similar to those found in her multicolored work. Every time she uses cobalt blue, she connects a dot back to the Chinese blue and white tradition and positions herself as a continuation of that tradition in the history of porcelain.

— Mara Superior

Blue Series

Mara Superior, “2020/USA/Vote/America”, 2019, high-fired porcelain, ceramic oxides, underglaze, glaze, ceramic decals, gold leaf, 13 x 16.25 x 2″.

ON HER POLITICAL & ENVIRONMENTAL SERIES

Artists can actualize tangible objects which address the frustrations that we commonly feel. In ceramics, there is a long, historic tradition of political commentary. Themes that pique our visual outcries range from canaries in the coal mine to thinking about citizenship, American and world history, power, democracy and the value and vulnerability of freedom. Since the invention of the printing press, drawings of political satire and humor have been used to inform and get a message out to the population. 17th and 18th century British and French political satire, as well as comic art and prints by James Gilroy and William Hogarth changed thinking with brilliant wit equaling high art. Goya, Daumier, Picasso, the Gorilla Girls, and today’s New Yorker Magazine covers by Barry Blit come to mind as artists make political-commentary in reaction to their times.

Political & Environmental Series

Mara Superior, “Only One Planet Earth”, 2019, high-fired porcelain, ceramic oxides, underglaze, glaze, gold leaf, 16 x 16 x 1.5”.

ON NATURE/NURTURE

“I was nurtured and encouraged to develop my imagination by my family and art teachers all the way through graduate school. Further enrichment came by way of my extraordinary good fortune to have been married to Roy Superior, a wonderful Artist and Professor of Art.

Over the course of my career, ceramics, art schools, museum curators and society have evolved to become more inclusive. Barriers have disintegrated, and currently, it feels as if ceramics is female-empowered given that so many of the magazine editors, gallerists and many curators are women.

For my entire professional career, I have been blessed to have only one brilliant and visionary female art dealer, Leslie Ferrin, of Ferrin Contemporary. Leslie has always encouraged my best work, offered me opportunities, and given me valued professional advice.

The choices that I employ regarding my own work for materials, content, palette and ornament might, by historical standards, be considered feminine work by nature. That label has never been a hindrance to me. I have had a very privileged life and career as an artist and am grateful for it all.

My piece in Ferrin Contemporary’s exhibition Nature/Nurture, Only One Planet Earth, is a commentary on the current predicament mankind is facing — Climate Change — and what to do about it. I can only hope that this universally shared crisis will bring out the best in us and bring humanity together to find remedies.”

FC NEWS & STORIES | MARA SUPERIOR | Nature/Nurture | Museum Acquisitions

Mara Superior, “Mother Nature Says, ‘Wake Up'” 2010, porcelain, glaze, wood, pearls, gold leaf, 17 x 22 x 2″.

DIRECTOR NOTES ON MARA SUPERIOR

In the works presented in Nature/Nurture, Superior’s political views are expressed front and center. The large-scale porcelains use the format of Renaissance-era storytelling platters with wide-rimmed borders functioning as frames. Carefully placed medallions and miniature objects in relief are emblazoned with messages delivered in delicately, hand-painted, calligraphic, heavily-laden serif fonts. Whether she is channeling mother nature or calling on higher powers to impact the coming election, Superior speaks loudly in large, all caps type, using the language of decorative arts to shout her beliefs in beauty and humanity’s inherent goodness.

Originally a New Yorker, Mara has been living and working in Western Massachusetts since the 70’s. Her life and work are an ode to Western culture. While embracing traditional values of home and beauty, her work is from a modern perspective with a feminist nod to sensuality and pleasure. Whenever possible, she spends leisure time wandering the museums of the world– in person. But, now, quarantined at home, she is touring these museums virtually, attending online classes, watching zoom lectures, and enjoying her vast library of gorgeous art books. She shares these moments along with the slow progress of painting her next work All American on her Instagram feed.

Superior met Leslie Ferrin at the beginning of her career. Both were in school, Mara at UMASS in the MAT program, Leslie at Hampshire College. Mara’s husband, Roy Superior, was Ferrin’s professor. They shared studios as artists, founding Pinch Pottery in Northampton, followed by East Street Clay Studios (Hadley, MA). Their intertwined, four-decade-long careers have weathered many changes and challenges over 40 years. Roy passed away in 2013, truly a renaissance man, an artist, sculptor, musician and beloved professor for 40 years spending 16 years at the University of the Arts in Philadelphia. Mara continues to live in the New England farmhouse they slowly renovated together, surrounded by the furniture he built to hold her works, his drawings, their library and his “wunderkammer” collections. The studio filled with hand made, hand tools, is still intact.

Superior’s artwork features ideas gleaned from research and travel, uniting all her interests in thematic approaches to specific content. Like her exuberant country garden, her work is always a beautiful mix of heirlooms and hybrids, free-ranging and grafts that come from strong rootstock. Her mashup mix of source material is delivered as stylized interpretations through images and didactic text. Using a combination of folk traditions, references to the classics of Western art, she infuses not so veiled socio-political messages from a contemporary perspective. Her deep love of ancient Greek, Roman, Asian antiquities, European and Early American pottery and ceramics – these objects become the subject matter of collection platters that feature miniature versions of her coveted favorites.

FC NEWS & STORIES | NATURE OF NURTURING | Notes from Director Leslie Ferrin

EXHIBITIONS

ON VIEW & RECENT EXHIBITIONS

Porcelain Love Letters Banner

PORCELAIN LOVE LETTERS: The Art of Mara Superior

Shelburne Museum
Shelburne, VT

Mara Superior’s porcelain art combines intricate painted imagery and sculptural forms to explore themes of art history, domesticity, and environmentalism. Often described as “love letters to the world,” Superior’s works invite viewers to engage with their timeless beauty and layered narratives. 

May 10 – October 26, 2025

PORTLAND VASE: MANIA AND MUSE

Crocker Art Museum
Sacramento, CA

The Portland Vase: Mania and Muse asks why and how a singular Classical vase becomes a legend, an “influencer,” and an artistic and commercial muse across time and place.

July 9, 2024 – September 15, 2024

CURRENT + RECENT EXHIBITIONS

IN PERMANENT COLLECTIONS

IN PERMANENT COLLECTIONS

At Ferrin Contemporary, we see firsthand the generosity of donors who are making it possible for artists to create new works through funded commissions and support of exhibitions that activate and build upon permanent collections.

With each acquisition, we witness the steady process and dedication of curators as they consider how these artworks fit into and are subsequently added to their collections. These efforts continue as exhibitions are curated, catalogs published and permanent collections reinterpreted.

READ OUR NOTE FROM DIRECTOR LESLIE FERRIN ON GROWING COLLECTIONS

A Collection Teapot Plaque
1988
high-fired English porcelain, ceramic oxides, underglazes, Cornwall Stone glaze
12.25 x 15.5 x 1″

Shelburne Museum, Gift of the Victoria Schonfeld Collection, 2025-12

A Pet – Jumbo
1991
high-fired English porcelain, ceramic oxides, underglazes, Cornwall Stone glaze
14 x 25 x 6.5″

Shelburne Musuem, acquisition made possible by Merle and Barry Ginsburg, 2025-6

AVAILABLE FROM COLLECTIONS

AVAILABLE FROM COLLECTIONS

Works from Private Collections by Mara Superior are available for sale, gift, or acquisition. For pricing and availability, please use the inquire form.

View Avalable Works from Private Collections
View More Collections
Mara Superior, “A Teapot/Hot Tea”, 1985, high-fired English porcelain, ceramic oxides, underglazes, Cornwall Stone glaze, 10 x 14 x 14.5″. John Polak Photography.
Mara Superior, “House Teapot”, c. 1985, high-fired English porcelain, ceramic oxides, underglazes, Cornwall Stone glaze, 13 x 14 x 5.5″.
Mara Superior, “A Collection of Teapots”, 1987, high-fired English porcelain, ceramic oxides, underglazes, Cornwall Stone glaze, 16 x 12 x 1.5″. John Polak Photography.
Mara Superior “A Home Comfort – A Retreat”, 1988, high-fired porcelain, ceramic oxides, underglaze, glaze, wood, faux marble paint, brass pins, Pot: 19 x 25 x 6″ Base: 24 x 9 x 4″.
Mara Superior “Evergreens”, 1985, high-fired porcelain, ceramic oxides, underglaze, glaze, Pot: 16 x 18 x 3.5″ Base :14.25 x 9 x 1.5″.
Mara Superior, “Chocolate Cocoa-Pot”, 1988, high-fired porcelain, ceramic oxides, underglaze, glaze, Pot: 19 x 14.5 x 5.5″ Base: 16 x 9 x 1.5″.
Mara Superior, “Mallard – Fish (Cylinder Vase)”, 1982, porcelain, slip, glaze, 8.5 x 7 x 7.5″. John Polak Photography.
Mara Superior, “Adam and Eve (Relief Platter)”, 1983, porcelain, slip glaze, 13″x 1.5″. John Polak Photography.

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PUBLICATIONS

PUBLICATIONS

Mara Superior, “Porcelain Love Letters: The Art of Mara Superior” | Exhibition Catalog

Mara Superior, “Porcelain Love Letters: The Art of Mara Superior”, Shelburne Museum Catalog

“Porcelain Love Letters: The Art of Mara Superior” celebrates the extraordinary ceramic work of Mara Superior, featuring essays, photography, and archival material from her career. Produced in partnership with Shelburne Museum and Ferrin Contemporary, this book offers insight into one of America’s most accomplished contemporary ceramic artists.

  • CopyrightŠ 2025
  • Published by Ferrin Contemporary in association with Shelburne Museum, 2025
  • Exhibition curator: Kory Rogers, Francie and John Downing Senior Curator of American Art
  • Artwork Photography: John Polak
  • Catalog Design: Mikulak Design
  • Porcelain Love Letters: The Art of Mara Superior is made possible by Merle and Barry Ginsburg, with additional support from Donna and Marvis Schwartz.
  • Photography made possible by the Kohler Foundation.
  • ISBN 978-0-9904312-3-7

Porcelain Love Letters: The Art of Mara Superior
May 10th – October 26th
Shelburne Museum, Shelburne, VT

Porcelain Love Letters: The Art of Mara Superior, Exhibition catalog, 2025, Cover

Porcelain Love Letters: The Art of Mara Superior

Buy Here

HEY! CÉRAMIQUE.S Exhibition Catalog

  • Released September 15, 2023
  • Edited by Anne Richard Bilingual (French / English)
  • 250 pages
  • Shaped cover 28 x 24.5 cm
  • Published by HEY! PUBLISHING

Long considered a minor art because of its particular status at the crossroads of art and craftsmanship, ceramics has emancipated itself artistically by making precisely this hybrid position the basis of its renewal. The truly alchemical dimension of the fire arts lends itself wonderfully to blurring and crossing boundaries.

Purchase the catalog

HEY! CÉRAMIQUES Catalog Cover"HEY! CÉRAMIQUE.S" Musee de la Halle Saint Pierre, Paris, France, September 20, 2023 to August 14, 2024.

HEY! CÉRAMIQUES Catalog Cover “HEY! CÉRAMIQUE.S” Musee de la Halle Saint Pierre, Paris, France, September 20, 2023 to August 14, 2024.

Mara Superior: Chronicling our Collective Hopes
By Lauren Levato Coyne, MFA, artist & writer

Superior’s works often reference the Renaissance, though she herself is akin to a medieval chronicler, a documentarian using stylized drawings (or sculptures in Superior’s case) and fanciful flourishes with a personalized spin to relay current events in an approachable manner. Superior’s high-relief porcelain works directly engage with our current socio-political moments while retaining hope for our collective future. Her whimsical storytelling pulls the threads of shared cultural histories in an attempt to activate our better angels.”

CLICK TO VIEW HEY! CERAMIQUE.S CATALOG, FEATURING THE FULL ARTICLE

 

Mara Superior, ”The Nymph of Spring (After Lucas Cranach)”, 2021, high-fired porcelain, ceramic oxides and underglazes, gold leaf, epoxy, digital print, 12.5 x 18.5 x 1.5″.

Collection Focus: Mara Superior at RAM

Blending past and present-day concerns, notions of Americana, and personal experience, Mara Superior playfully both challenges and adds to a history of porcelain decorative objects and tableware. With a singular aesthetic that feels reverent yet unique, Superior builds narratives that unfold through images, words, and form.

Comprised entirely of work from RAM’s collection that span over three decades, this exhibition showcases several of the artist’s core interests. They emphasize Superior’s personal history—her connection to art and ceramic history, her appreciation for “home” and ideas about the domestic, and her love of travel. While these are not the only topics she addresses in her work, they are foundational ones and provide a layered and nuanced accounting of the artist’s approach to working with porcelain. Engaging scenes play out across a range of objects, including platters, teapots, vessels, and a collaborative piece with the artist’s late husband, sculptor and furniture maker, Roy Superior.

Significantly, this exhibition debuts a multi-piece gift from the Kohler Foundation, Inc., that catapults RAM’s holdings of work by Superior from two pieces, already gifted by other donors, to 33. In doing so, this gift establishes several milestones for Superior at RAM—making her an archive artist as well as the most collected female ceramic artist and the second most collected ceramic artist regardless of gender.

Preview the Exhibition Catalog  •  HERE  •

Exhibition Notes (PDF)

A Conversation with Mara Superior and Bruce W. Pepich, Unabridged (PDF)

Further information about the artist:

Mara Superior’s Website

Review by Angela Fina from the Exhibitions section of American Ceramics, Volume 7, Number 2, 1989 (PDF)

Oral History Interview with Mara Superior—Archives of American Art

Artist Spotlight from a 2018 Exhibition at The Frick Pittsburgh

Collection Focus: Mara Superior at RAM

Collection Focus: Mara Superior at RAM

Buy Here

Mara Superior: A Retrospective

Published in 2006 by New Britain Museum of American Art, New Britain, CT

Forward by Douglas Hyland, Director, New Britain Museum of American Art.

Essay by Bruce W. Pepich, Executive Director and Curator of Collection, Racine Art Museum, Racine, WI.

32-page, full-color exhibition catalog

Mara Superior: A Retrospective

Mara Superior: A Retrospective

Buy Here

VIDEOS

VIDEOS FEATURING MARA SUPERIOR

Webinar: Artistic Eye – Seeing the World through Mara Superior’s Ceramic Art

Mara Superior, acclaimed ceramic artist known for blending delicate ceramic pieces with sharp social commentary, joins curator Kory Rogers for an engaging hour-long webinar discussion about her life, her art, and her creative inspirations. Discover how Mara’s passion for art history and world travel shapes her work, how historical subjects inspire contemporary conversations, and how she reimagines traditional forms like teapots into striking 3D sculptures. Don’t miss this exploration of creativity and innovation and learn more about Mara prior to the opening of her 2025 exhibition, Porcelain Love Letters: The Art of Mara Superior.

Uploaded on Apr 11, 2025 at 12:54 pm

Virtual Tour of Collection Focus: Mara Superior at Racine Art Museum

Virtual exhibition tour with RAM Executive Director and Curator of Collections Bruce W. Pepich and RAM Curator of Exhibitions Lena Vigna
Video produced by Matt Binetti, Reservoir Video Co.

Join Racine Art Museum’s (RAM’s) Executive Director and Curator of Collections Bruce W. Pepich as well as Curator of Exhibitions Lena Vigna for a 14-minute virtual tour of the exhibition, Collection Focus: Mara Superior

For more about Superior and the exhibition at RAM, please visit: RAM Art: Mara Superior

Bennington Museum: Conversation with Mara Superior

Conversation with Jamie Franklin, curator at the Bennington Museum of Art continues his online series, “Chats with Jamie” with Ferrin Contemporary artist MARA SUPERIOR to discuss her dynamic practice and new works while in quarantine.

For more about Superior and the exhibition at Bennington Museum of Art, please visit: Bennington Museum 

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12
May
2017
JASON WALKER

JASON WALKER

ARTWORKS

ARTWORKS & INSTALLATIONS

LIZARD DRAIN

Jason Walker
“Lizard Drain”
2024
porcelain, underglaze
11 x 11 x 1″

Jason Walker, "Lizard Drain", 2024, porcelain and underglaze, 11 x 1", photo courtesy of the artist

ON LIZARD DRAIN

Lizard Drain is a play on how technologies are being developed and advancing quite rapidly, yet as a species our operating system is still the Lizard Brain. Things such as A.I., WiFi, and internet goggles are taking control of our bodies and mediating most of our lives. It has changed our perceptions of ourselves and ideas such as nature. Yet the genie is out of the bottle and these technologies will persist. We need to ask how we want to progress as a species – do we want to continue with our course of self-destruction, war and disembodied experiences? OR, can we somehow change course and become more compassionate and tolerant? It is salient because the way in which we see ourselves will determine the way in which we will model and develop new technologies and our perceptions of nature.

– Jason Walker, 2024

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DOUBLE VISION

Jason Walker
Double Vision
2022
porcelain, underglaze
17 x 13 x 9″

FEEL LIKE I AM STANDING STILL

Jason Walker
Feel Like I am Standing Still
2022
porcelain, underglaze
16 x 22 x 13″

OSPREY

Jason Walker
Osprey
2018
porcelain, underglaze, luster, concrete
11 x 14 x 6″

TREE OF AVARICE

Jason Walker
Tree of Avarice
2022
wood panel, acrylic paint, porcelain, luster
71 x 48 x 5″ (6’ x 4 ‘ x 5”)

ADDITIONAL WORKS

BLOOM


Jason Walker
Bloom
2019
porcelain, underglaze, china paint
26 x 26 x 9″

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LIVING IN BETWEEN


Jason Walker
Living in Between
2020
porcelain, underglaze, concrete
13.5 x 10.5 x 6″

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NESTING WITH THE SOCIALS


Jason Walker
Nesting with the Socials
2020
porcelain, underglaze
15 x 12 x 10″

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YOU MAY THINK YOU ARE ALONE…


Jason Walker
You May Think You Are Alone…
2019
porcelain, underglaze, sandstone
22 x 25 x 15″

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WILDFLOWERS


Jason Walker
Wildflowers
2015
porcelain, stoneware, china paint, wood, spray paint
23 x 20 x 20″

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ABOUT

JASON WALKER

Jason Walker Artist Portrait, 2019

FOR MORE

JASONWALKERCERAMICS.COM

CV

BIO

ABOUT

American, b.1973, Pocatello, ID
lives and works in Cedar City, UT

Jason Walker’s ceramic sculpture question how we perceive and decipher technology and nature within our changing world. He has exhibited and taught widely including at the Renwick Gallery at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington D.C., Haystack Mountain School for the Crafts, Penland School for the Crafts, Anderson Ranch Arts Center, The Pottery Workshop in Jingdezhen, China and the International Ceramics Workshop, Kecskemet, Hungary, South Korea, Ireland and France.

Walker has been awarded a 2009 NCECA International Residency Fellowship and a 2014 Artist Trust Fellowship from Washington State, as well as the Taunt Fellowship award at the Archie Bray Foundation for the Ceramic Arts. His work is included in collections at the Fine Art Museum of San Francisco: De Young, the Carnegie Mellon Museum in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, the Arizona State University Art Museum Ceramic Research Center, Tempe, Arizona and the Portland Art Museum in Portland, Oregon.

Walker received a BFA from Utah State University and a MFA from Penn State University and is represented by Ferrin Contemporary, and currently resides in Cedar City, Utah and is Lecturer of Ceramics at Southern Utah University.

Jason Walker, "Lizard Drain", 2024, porcelain and underglaze, 11 x 1", photo courtesy of the artist

Jason Walker, “Lizard Drain”, 2024, porcelain and underglaze, 11 x 1″, photo courtesy of the artist

ON LIZARD DRAIN

Lizard Drain is a play on how technologies are being developed and advancing quite rapidly, yet as a species our operating system is still the Lizard Brain. Things such as A.I., WiFi, and internet goggles are taking control of our bodies and mediating most of our lives. It has changed our perceptions of ourselves and ideas such as nature. Yet the genie is out of the bottle and these technologies will persist. We need to ask how we want to progress as a species – do we want to continue with our course of self-destruction, war and disembodied experiences? OR, can we somehow change course and become more compassionate and tolerant? It is salient because the way in which we see ourselves will determine the way in which we will model and develop new technologies and our perceptions of nature.

– Jason Walker, 2024

Jason Walker, “Bloom”, 2019, porcelain, underglaze, china paint, 26 x 26 x 9″. Installation view in “Personal Encounters”, solo exhibition at Ferrin Contemporary, 2019

ON HIS WORK

The culture I live in does not emphasize our physical connection and dependence on nature. The current ideology is reliant upon technology, and it promotes disembodied activity such as television [and] computers . . . The gap between man-made and natural is ever increasing.

Light bulbs, plugs, power-lines and pipes that grow from the earth are common images found in my work, juxtaposed with birds, insects, and organic matter such as leaves and trees. Similar to the thinking of the Hudson River School of painting, I attempt to portray nature’s vastness and human-kind as a small proponent of it. Yet I draw the small things of nature large and the huge creations of man small. I want to show how we influence the landscape, or nature. My ideas stem from my own experiences bicycle touring, backpacking and the daily hikes I take with my dog.

In an attempt to explore the methods of early American artists, such as Moran and Cole from the Hudson River School of Painting, I went to an American ‘wilderness’ and backpacked solo with my sketchbook for ten days. The landscape, plant and animal imagery are records from my experience in the Grand Staircase – Escalante National Monument in the desert of southern Utah. The technological imagery is a record of objects in my everyday experience and is used to express the way in which technology has influenced our perceptions of nature.  I developed a narrative based on the historical progression of our changing perceptions of ‘nature’ and ‘wilderness’ in America.  I titled the show ‘Nature Seeker’ because I think we use term nature very loosely in our language today, and as I hiked I felt as though I was seeking a place or an object that embodied the word nature. According to Webster’s dictionary, nature is something in its essential form untouched and untainted by human hand. So here lies the crux of my quest. At the very heart of our own description of nature we exclude ourselves from it. Does this mean I am not natural? Although this argument may seem purely semantic it is not. The way in which we perceive nature inadvertently describes the way in which we perceive ourselves. Ultimately, my quest is a journey to define for myself what it means to be human in the present time.

– Jason Walker

EXHIBITIONS

CURRENT + RECENT EXHIBITIONS

Are We There Yet? 2023, Chris Antemann, Sergei Isupov, Lauren Mabry

Are We There Yet? 2023, Chris Antemann, Sergei Isupov, Lauren Mabry

ARE WE THERE YET?

2023 | Group exhibition at Ferrin Contemporary

NORTH ADAMS, MA – ARE WE THERE YET? is a celebration of Ferrin Contemporary’s 40+ years as leaders in the field of modern and contemporary ceramics. What began in 1979 as a woman-owned cooperative studio and gallery in Northampton, MA has flourished across the years and the locations to become the international ceramic experts and material champions known as Ferrin Contemporary.

View the exhibition page HERE

Our America/Whose America? Installation, Michelle Erickson, Jason Walker, photo credit: John Polak

OUR AMERICA/WHOSE AMERICA?

2022 | Group Exhibition at Ferrin Contemporary | North Adams, MA

Our America/Whose America? Is a “call and response” exhibition between contemporary artists and historic ceramic objects.

View the exhibition page HERE  & View the historic collection HERE

Featuring  Back Flow and Bristlecone:

HEY! Le Dessin, installation view with Jason Walker, 2022

HEY! LE DESSIN

2022 | Group Exhibition at MusĂŠe de la Halle Saint Pierre | Paris, France

113 artists, more than 500 artwork, and 20 countires

View the exhibition page HERE

Featuring Living in Between & Blooms:

PAST EXHIBITIONS

NEWS & FEATURES

NEWS & FEATURES

NCECA PITTSBURGH

NCECA PITTSBURGH
REVIVE, REMIX, RESPOND The Frick Pittsburgh 7227 Reynolds Street, Pittsburgh Group show of contemporary artists who are breathing new life...
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Jason Walker: Two Solo Shows

Jason Walker: Two Solo Shows

Jason Walker’s two solo exhibitions are on view in Bellingham, Wash., and Pittsburgh, featuring recent constructions and selected individual sculptures…

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ON THE RIVER, DOWN THE ROAD

Published in 2014 by Bellevue Arts Museum, Bellevue, Washington

Forward by Stefano Catalani

Interview with Jason Walker and Stefano Catalani: A Conversation on Rivers, Roads, and the Split Down the Middle

Exploring the ecological and existential themes informing the site-specific installation

20-page, full-color exhibition catalog

BRIDGE 13: Jason Walker

This brochure, published by the Society of Contemporary Craft, includes biographical information on Walker as well as an essay by William L. Fox, Director of the Center for Art + Environment, Nevada Museum of Art, Reno, Nevada

Click here to view.

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10
May
2017
KURT WEISER

KURT WEISER

ARTWORKS

AVAILABLE ARTWORK

View available works by Kurt Weiser from Private Collections

Night Garden

Wildfall

Sunhouse

Confidential

Available from Private Collections

Untitled Black and White Vase  #1 & 2

Black and White Vase  #1 & 2

KURT WEISER INSOMNIA PRINT SERIES

“These prints are the beginning of an exploration into 30 years of private sketchbooks. Some books are 30 years old and others just weeks. The past stimulates the future and the present is a matter of interpretation. It’s the exploration into the familiar that is always a surprise.”

— Kurt Weiser

About the Prints

Each print is in an edition of 10, 24 x 36 inches on a 30 x 44 inch Somerset 250 gsm paper, printed from linoleum cuts by Dan Mayer at Pyracantha Press. The Press is part of the Herberger Institute for Design and the Arts at Arizona State University in Tempe, AZ. Oleander and Flight Over Kansas are the first two of ten prints started in the summer of 2016.

About the Pyracantha Press

 

Pyracantha Press is the independent publishing imprint in the Herberger Institute School of Art at Arizona State University. The Press is directed by Daniel Mayer who has produced inter-disciplinary collaborative works since 1986. Projects created under the Press are limited-edition books and prints that reflect our cultural landscape. Each project is unique and experimental in form and content. Press publications are in 105 national and international public collections such as Columbia University, Library of Congress, The Getty, Klingspor-Stadt Museum, Letterform Archive, Wellesley, Yale, and among others. Mayer’s private studio practices include award-winning large-scale public art projects, national and international exhibitions, collections, and artist’s residencies. Mayer was a nominee for the 2016 Arizona Governor’s Arts Awards, individual artist category.

CLICK ICONS BELOW TO VIEW

CIRCUMSTANCE

Kurt Weiser, "Circumstance" (Edition of 10), 2017, linocut print, ink on Somerset paper, print: 36 x 24"; paper: 44 x 30".

Kurt Weiser, “Circumstance” (Edition of 10), 2017, linocut print, ink on Somerset paper, print: 36 x 24″; paper: 44 x 30″.



FLIGHT OVER KANSAS

Kurt Weiser, “Flight Over Kansas” (Edition of 10), 2017, linocut print, ink on Somerset paper, print: 36 x 24″; paper: 44 x 30″.



NIGHTSHADE

Kurt Weiser, “Nightshade”(Edition of 10), 2017, linocut print, ink on Somerset paper, print: 36 x 24″; paper: 44 x 30”.



OLEANDER

Kurt Weiser, "Oleander" (Edition of 10), 2017, linocut print, ink on Somerset paper, print: 24 x 36"; paper: 30 x 44".

Kurt Weiser, “Oleander” (Edition of 10), 2017, linocut print, ink on Somerset paper, print: 24 x 36″; paper: 30 x 44″.



HOTHOUSE

Kurt Weiser, ‘Hothouse’ 2019, linocut print, ink on Somerset 250 gsm paper, 26 x 35.5″.



INSOMNIA

Kurt Weiser, “Insomnia” 2019, 2019, linocut print, ink on Somerset 250 gsm paper, 24 x 36″.



HIGHWAY 12

Kurt Weiser, “Highway 12″ 2019, 2019, linocut print, ink on Somerset 250 gsm paper, 36 x 28”.



MILKWEED

Kurt Weiser, “Milkweed” 2019, 2019, linocut print, ink on Somerset 250 gsm paper, 36 x 27″.



ABOUT

KURT WEISER

KURT WEISER

BIO

CV

ABOUT

American, b. 1950
lives and works in Tempe, AZ

Kurt Weiser’s ceramic work draws inspiration from rich evocations of plant life to narratives derived from myth and history, placed into highly detailed tropical landscapes. These images are meticulously painted onto porcelain teapots, globes and other vessels. As Weiser notes “the painting is the three-dimensional reality”.

His most recent body of work includes linoleum-cut prints, inspired by decades of drawings from his sketchbooks. He has paired these prints with black and white vessels, relying on his graphic and fantastical style as the means for relating these rich narratives.

Weiser has shown internationally and throughout the United States, including solo exhibitions at the Montgomery Museum of Art (Montgomery, AL) the Museum of Contemporary Craft (Portland, OR) and the Holter Museum of Art (Helena, MT). His work can be found in numerous public collections, including Smithsonian Institution, Alfred University School of Ceramics, and the Los Angeles Museum of Art among many others. Weiser received his M.F.A. from the University of Michigan and recently retired from the position of Regents Professor of Art at Arizona State University in Tempe, Arizona.

Kurt Weiser, “Insomnia”, 2019, installation view, Ferrin Contemporary.

ON HIS WORK

“For years the work I did in ceramics was an effort to somehow express the beautiful nature of the material. Somewhere in the midst of this struggle I realized that the materials are there to allow you to say what you need to say, not to tell you what to say. So I gave up trying to control nature and decided to use what I had learned about the materials to express some ideas about nature itself and my place in it.” — Kurt Weiser

ON HIS PRINTS

“These prints are the beginning of an exploration into 30 years of private sketchbooks. Some books are 30 years old and others just weeks. The past stimulates the future and the present is a matter of interpretation. It’s the exploration into the familiar that is always a surprise.”

Prints are in editions of 10, 24 x 36 inches on a 30 x 44 inch paper, printed from Somerset 250 gsm linoleum cuts and printed at the Arizona State University Print Studio in Tempe, AZ, by Dan Mayer. Oleander and Flight Over Kansas are the first two of ten prints started in the summer of 2016. — Kurt Weiser

EXHIBITIONS

CURRENT + RECENT EXHIBITIONS

NEWS & FEATURES

NEWS & FEATURES

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INQUIRE

INQUIRE

Additional works may be available to acquire, but not listed here.

If interested in lists of all works and series: Send us a message

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10
May
2017
MARK SHAPIRO

MARK SHAPIRO

FEATURED

ARTWORK

ARTWORKS & INSTALLATIONS

BARRELS

ABOUT

MARK SHAPIRO

STONEPOOLPOTTERY.COM

BIO

ABOUT

In 1986, I moved from New York City to rural Western Massachusetts to make pots and build a wood kiln. I was able to buy a shipwreck of an old place that has an unusual feature from which I took the name for my pottery—a stone pool that Russell Conwell, turn-of-the-century preacher and educator and founder of Temple University in Philadelphia had built in 1893. The farmhouse, where Conwell was born, is rich in history—it had been a stop on the Underground Railroad during Conwell’s childhood, and he remembered John Brown and Frederick Douglass staying at the house.

While working on the place, I dug up a shard of a gray salt-glazed four-gallon crock that happened to have the makers’ stamp on it. “Hastings and Belding, Ashfield Mass.” It turned out to have been made only about 15 miles from my home and studio, at the middle of the last century. It got me thinking about pots that were made, bought, used, broken and disposed of within a specific region and the connection this implies between the community of users and makers. It led to my decision to move and restore the old shed (the one where fugitive slaves had slept) for use as a gallery to welcome local people at the pottery. It also prompted a deeper interest in early New England potters and their wares. In particular, the pots made from 1790–1830, wonderful swelling volumes of ovoid forms with their firing scars and flashing, spoke to me as powerful vernacular objects.

Before moving to Western Massachusetts, I had been living in New York and making sculpture while supporting myself as a carpenter. The turn to pottery answered the vexing problem that I had been unable to resolve with my sculpture: Where does the stuff go? On a pedestal in patron’s living room? In front of a building? In a museum storage vault? As a potter, on the other hand, my work would be held and used; it would stay in the main places of people’s lives. And, I could control most aspects of creative production—the concept, making, finishing, marketing and selling of the work, in a process and within a scale that preserves and enhances the humanity of the creative experience. As my work has evolved I continue to be compelled by the challenges of domestic pottery, but I have also recently become interested as in making larger scale work that is more appropriate to the scale and abstractness gallery space than the kitchen.

EXHIBITIONS

EXHIBITIONS

Are We There Yet? 2023, Chris Antemann, Sergei Isupov, Lauren Mabry

“ARE WE THERE YET?”

July 15th – September 2nd, 2023 | Ferrin Contemporary

ARE WE THERE YET? is a celebration of Ferrin Contemporary’s 40+ years as leaders in the field of modern and contemporary ceramics. What began in 1979 as a woman-owned cooperative studio and gallery in Northampton, MA has flourished across the years and the locations to become the international ceramic experts and material champions known as Ferrin Contemporary.

View the exhibition page here

NEWS

NEWS

INQUIRE

INQUIRE

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