Project Tag: Robert Silverman Past

MELTING POINT

MELTING POINT

HELLER GALLERY

303 10th Avenue, New York, NY

FERRIN CONTEMPORARY

1315 MASS MoCA Way, North Adams MA


June 24 to September 25, 2021

ABOUT THE EXHIBITION


The Melting Point is the degree when solid becomes soft, eventually becoming liquid and a boiling point is reached. Glaze melts, clay and glass soften, surface and form become pliable. This exhibition surveys a ​diverse ​group of artists whose use of the melting point is central to their practice.

Used metaphorically, as the planet warms we are finding ourselves closer to the melting point both physically and socially. In 2020, forces combined under pressure of the COVID virus, politics exploded and nature responded with melting ice, raging fires and extreme weather. Likewise, artists use the melting point as a metaphor in their work to express their political beliefs and sound the alarm using the fragile materials of glass and ceramic.

The exhibition is ​a ​collaboration​ between Ferrin Contemporary in North Adams, MA on the MASS MoCA campus and ​Heller Gallery, located in the Chelsea Art District of New York City​. The co-curators and gallery directors are renowned specialists in their fields, Leslie Ferrin (ceramics) and Katya Heller (glass).

VIEW THE EXHIBITION CATALOG HERE

PRESENTATION at Ferrin Contemporary


PRESENTATION at Heller Gallery


EXHIBITING ARTISTS

PAST PROGRAMMING

SELECT PRESS


MELTING POINT in the Boston Globe
8.5.21 Cate McQuaid gives a quick glance at the exhibition in The Ticket section of The Boston Globe.

Arriving at the MELTING POINT in Destination Williamstown
7.20.21 Destination Williamstown interviews Ferrin Contemporary Director Leslie Ferrin and gets to the historical heart of MELTING POINT.

BUSINESS MONDAY: Did people buy art during COVID? 
6.28.21 Julia Dickson of The Berkshire Eagle reports on a “difficult but successful” year for Berkshire gallerists.

BOBBY SILVERMAN AT PORCHES INN

BOBBY SILVERMAN AT PORCHES INN

2021 Summer Season

Presented at
The Porches Inn at MASS MoCA
231 River St. North Adams, MA 01247

ABOUT THE FEATURE

Ferrin Contemporary curates changing art by gallery artists at Porches Inn, often concurrent with the exhibitions. Porches Inn is a short walk from the gallery on the MASS MoCA campus in North Adams. 

Over the last 30 years, Bobby Silverman has become one of the foremost contemporary artists and designers working in ceramics.

Originally trained in Japan with the Master Potter Samejima Saturo, Silverman continued his undergraduate studies at the Kansas City Art Institute and received his Master of Fine Arts from Alfred University in 1983. Since then, he has taught and directed several university programs including the #5 ranked graduate program at Louisiana State University.

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 originate 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.

He has exhibited internationally and his work is included in the collections of the European Ceramic Work Center in the Netherlands, the Museum of Art and Design, NY, and the Renwick Gallery of the Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, DC . He is represented by Bentley Gallery, Phoenix/Scottsdale, AZ, Harvey Meadows Gallery, Aspen, CO and Sherry Leedy Contemporary Art, Kansas City, MO.

Previous Installation & Additionally Available

GLAZED & DIFFUSED

GLAZED & DIFFUSED

1315 MASS MoCA Way, North Adams, MA

ABOUT THE EXHIBITION


North Adams, MA —

Glazed & Diffused is a survey exhibition focused on a select group of international artists, from George Ohr (b. 1857) to several mid-career artists chosen from the exhibition Ceramic Top 40. These artists use fired clay and glaze pigment to convey abstract content. Their sculpture, objects, vessels, tile, and site-specific installations reveal intended, abstract results using fluidity, abstraction, and color theory.

Spanning eight weeks this summer, Glazed and Diffused will bring attention to the lively dialogue surrounding the dissolution of categorical constraints in institutions and the art market through programming that includes panel discussions, DISH + DINE events and Artist Salons

“Over the course of my career, I have witnessed both the emergence of abstract clay sculpture in the late 1950s and 60s and its re-emergence as a fine art trend fully integrated into contemporary art market.  In 2015 fine artists are regularly creating objects and sculpture in clay alongside their works in painting and various other mediums, and likewise their galleries are mounting solo and group exhibitions inclusive of ceramics.”

“Within encyclopedic museums, the permanent collections and period rooms are offering new contexts for contemporary ceramic art to be considered both chronologically and thematically alongside parallel artwork in all media. The “Dirt on Delight” exhibition presented in 2009 at the Institute of Contemporary Art in Philadelphia, was the important seminal museum survey that ignited interest and marked the moment when ceramics not only garnered the attention of New York’s illustrious art critics, such as Roberta Smith, but also that of the Chelsea galleries who began to focus attention on a younger generation alongside the known masters of the medium — Viola Frey, Betty Woodman, Peter Voulkos, Ken Price and Robert Arneson.

“Dirt on Delight: Impulses That Form Clay,” curated by Ingrid Shaffner and Jenelle Porter, was accompanied by a catalog that included Glenn Adamson’s essay “Sloppy Seconds: The Strange Return of Clay.” Since that moment,  curators have turned their sights towards ceramics in survey exhibitions organized during Pacific Time in California, by Crystal Bridges, the Venice Biennale, and the Whitney Biennial. (In 2014, the Whitney Biennial featured sculpture by ceramic master John Mason alongside younger counterparts who have only recently aligned with the medium.)” – Leslie Ferrin, Curator

EXHIBITING ARTISTS


PRESS & PROGRAMMING


PAST EVENTS


OPENING RECEPTION
Saturday, June 20, 4 to 6 pm | Ferrin Contemporary, 1315 MASS MoCA Way, North Adams, MA

Meet artists Raymon Elozua, Lauren Mabry, Peter Pincus, Robert Silverman, and Linda Sormin.

ARTIST SALON AND SUNDAY BRUNCH
Sunday, June 21, 11 am to 1 pm | Project Art, 54 Main Street, Cummington

Visual presentations and roundtable discussion with artists Raymon Elozua, Lauren Mabry, Robert Silverman, and Linda Sormin

PANEL DISCUSSION: “CLAY IS HOT! Good Better Best”
Sunday, July 19, 3 pm | 1315 MASS MoCA Way, North Adams, MA

Collecting ceramics from George Ohr to Ai Weiwei — Antiques Roadshow regulars Suzanne Perrault and David Rago, along with the consulting producer Daniel Farrell will discuss collecting ceramics made in the late 1800s through today. The panel, moderated by Ferrin Contemporary director, Leslie Ferrin, will focus on provenance, connoisseurship, and values in ceramics.for a panel discussion moderated by Leslie Ferrin about provenance, connoisseurship, and values in ceramics, pottery, and porcelain 1900 to the present.Guests will have a chance to view the exhibition, GLAZED & DIFFUSED, before the panel discussion and afterwards during a wine and cheese reception in the gallery.

DISH & DINE
Sunday, July 19, 6:30 to 9 pm | Ferrin Contemporary, 1315 MASS MoCA Way, North Adams, MA

Following the panel discussion and reception, enjoy dinner in the gallery with collectors, artists, and panelists. Gramercy Bistro, MASS MoCA’s in-house bistro, will serve modern fare made from locally-sourced food. Ceramic artist Michael McCarthy will provide the handmade dinnerware. Limited space and fee for the dinner.
TO RSVP  More…

STUDIO AND GALLERY VISIT
Saturday, August 8, 2015 | Kinderhook, New York
Visit Raymon Elozua’s studio in Mountain Dale, NY, and tour of the El Anatusui exhibition at Jack Shainman Gallery: The School in nearby Kinderhook. Trip and transportation organized by Ferrin Contemporary. Limited space and fee.TO RSVP More…

DOWNSTREET NORTH ADAMS
Thursdays, June 25 and July 30, August 27, and September 24, 6 to 8 pm | Ferrin Contemporary | 1315 MASS MoCA Way and throughout North Adams

Ferrin Contemporary and other DownStreet art venues and galleries, stores, and restaurants will extend their hours on the last Thursday of the summer months to celebrate the arts.

 

ARTIST TALK WITH ROBERT SILVERMAN AND CLOSING RECEPTION
Sunday, August 16, 3–5pm | Ferrin Contemporary, 1315 MASS MoCA Way, North Adams, MA

Artist Robert Silverman will talk about his inspiration for “Tirana” a featured piece in the GLAZED & DIFFUSED exhibition. Eddie Rama, artist and mayor of Tirana, Albania, who transformed the city with color, was Silverman’s inspiration for this piece. After the talk, join us for the closing reception of GLAZED & DIFFUSED.

NEW YORK CERAMICS & GLASS FAIR 2015

NEW YORK CERAMICS & GLASS FAIR 2015

NYCGF logo 2015

Bohemian National Hall, 321 East 73rd Street
(between 1st & 2nd Avenues)
New York, NY

SELECTED WORKS FROM CURRENT PROJECTS
Ferrin Contemporary booth on the 4th floor

MADE IN CHINA: THE NEW EXPORT WARE
Ferrin Contemporary Special Exhibition Booth on the 3rd Floor

EVENTS

MEET THE ARTISTS
in the Special Exhibition Booth on the 3rd Floor

Join us for a conversation about MADE IN CHINA: THE NEW EXPORT WARE with artists Sin-ying Ho and Robert Silverman. The discussion will be moderated by Leslie Ferrin, curator of MADE IN CHINA and director of Ferrin Contemporary. A tour of the exhibition with the artists and curator, will follow.

MADE IN CHINA ARTIST & CURATOR LECTURES

Friday, January 23, 2015

12 noon
ARTIST TALK: Paul Scott
Duchess, Dogs, Detroit, Dragons, Handles and Cherrypickers: Re-Animating the Transferware Archives of an Industry 
with Paul Scott: artist, author, and professor at the Oslo National Academy of the Arts Norway

1:30 p.m.
BOOK SIGNING: Paul Scott
Join us! Paul Scott will sign and present his new book Horizon, Transferware and Contemporary Ceramics.

2 pm
CURATOR TALK : Leslie Ferrin
Made in China: New Export Ware from Jingdezhen with Leslie Ferrin, curator of MADE IN CHINA and director Ferrin Contemporary

4 pm
ARTIST TALK: Garth Johnson
I’m So Fancy: Young Artists Take On Historical Ceramics with Garth Johnson, Curator of the Arizona State University Ceramics Research Center and Director-at-Large of the National Council on Education for the Ceramic Arts (NCECA).

 

Saturday, January 24

12 noon
LECTURE: RON FUCHS II
The Most Dangerous Imitations: Fake Chinese Export Porcelain of the 1920s and ’30s with Ron Fuchs II, Curator of the Reeves Collections at Washington and Lee University.

3pm
CONVERSATION and TOUR with artists and curator

Click here to view press release.
Click here for downloadable pdf of press release.

SELECTED WORKS FROM CURRENT PROJECTS

Frances PalmerFrances Palmer, "Oval Footed Bowl with Trees" 2014, porcelain, cobalt, glaze, gold luster, 13 x 6.5 x 7".

Bonnie Smith

This group exhibition brings together work by several top ceramic artists represented by Ferrin Contemporary. Included will be pieces by Stephen Bowers, Claire Curneen, Steven Young Lee, Frances Palmer, Paul Scott, Bonnie Smith, Vipoo Srivilasa, Mara Superior, and Kurt Weiser. Form and surface merge in various constructions embodying elements of the human form, of animals, and of abstracted thought. The work in this exhibit gives a taste of the broad range of work being created in ceramics today.

MADE IN CHINA: THE NEW EXPORT WARE

Sam Chung

Future Retrieval

Future Retrieval, "Gangsters Paradise" (installation) detail, 2014, porcelain, wood, cut paper, 40 x 20 x 8".

MADE IN CHINA : The New Export Ware

MADE IN CHINA : The New Export Ware

MADE IN CHINA

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OCTOBER 18–NOVEMBER 16

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DECEMBER 2–7


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JANUARY 21–25

 

MADE IN CHINA is a curated series of exhibitions and talks, examines the contemporary, ceramic-centric exchange between eastern and western artists and markets.

JULIE BARTHOLOMEW

ROBIN BEST

CAROLINE CHENG

SIN-YING HO

GARTH JOHNSON

PAUL MATHIEU

PAUL SCOTT

ROBERT SILVERMAN

VIPOO SRIVILASA


MADE IN CHINA reveals a dynamic relationship — with appropriation and collaboration occurring in both directions.

Marked by ever-increasing cross-cultural collaboration, this contemporary ceramics movement emerging from China is urging a re-definition of today’s export ware. With increasing frequency, western artists are traveling to China to produce ceramic work using traditional Chinese methods. Exhibitions in the United States, Australia, and Europe are bringing forward a new generation of export ware. In the summer of 2014, Leslie Ferrin travelled to Hong Kong, Chongqing, Jindezhen, and Shanghai to explore this growing cultural exchange. She participated in and lectured at workshops, visited galleries and museums, and toured studios where western artists work in collaboration with skilled Chinese artisans.

In this exhibition, Ferrin brings together work that reveals the essential aspects of contemporary ceramics currently coming out of China.

“After my visit to China, it was clear that this growing movement of western artists engaging with Chinese artisans to provide works for international markets was urging a contemporary re-definition of export ware. It is a dynamic relationship with appropriation and collaboration occurring in both directions, and we are fortunate that we will be able to truly explore the relationship, multiple exhibitions over the coming year.”– Leslie Ferrin


ABOUT MADE IN CHINA 

Inspired by her recent travels in China, MADE IN CHINA  is curated by Ferrin Contemporary Director Leslie Ferrin. See images from Ferrin’s travels below or click here for the full gallery on scene + seen.

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See all #chinainchina2014 images on scene + seen

Sponsored as a guest lecturer by the Sichuan Fine Arts Institute, Ferrin traveled to China in June and July 2014 with the aim of gaining a greater understanding of the cross-cultural collaboration, production, and appropriation occurring in the New Export Ware movement. During her visit, Ferrin visited ceramic workshops in Jingdezhen and Chongqing, where – similar to the historical model of export ware – skilled Chinese artisans, produce contemporary works for Western markets under the direction of visiting Western artists.

“After my visit to China, it was clear that this growing movement of Western artists engaging with Chinese artisans to provide works for international markets was urging a contemporary re-definition of export-ware,” says Ferrin. “It is a dynamic relationship with appropriation and collaboration occurring in both directions, and we are fortunate that we will be able to truly explore the relationship, with multiple exhibitions over the coming year.”



Click here to read Blouin Art Info article on Made in China.