ABOUT

My current work involves the search for discarded, factory-made objects I find in scrap yards, junk shops, and in my day-to-day life. I am continually building an inventory of shapes, colors, and textures from these sources while searching for the affinity between them and the clay forms I make in the studio. My search has evolved to include not only discards, but used art, fragments of images found within an object, and family treasures. By looking for objects that attract my eye without concern for practicality, intended purpose, or perceived value, I invite the process to guide and inform my direction.

Once the found elements reach the studio, I begin another kind of search, this time for connections like words in a sentence. In this series called “Stacks,” found objects and sculpted clay components move through a number of precarious alignments created by shifts in form, texture, and proportion from top to bottom, until the composition finally snaps and feels right. The once utilitarian parts no longer serve their intended purpose, for when they are aligned with the ceramic forms through visual and physical connections, they become aesthetic objects. At first glance the finished “stacks” seem familiar, even at times elegant, but as the viewer begins to identify each part the affinity between the aesthetic and the functional reveals a curious tension––a tension between the whole and the parts. Resume.