Jonathan Adler and the Business of art

My post for this week is about the pottery of Jonathan Adler. Adlers works are playful, many seem to flavored with a touch of cynicism and sarcastic humor. Others are just plain fun. By looking at the forms it seems as though most of them have been slip cast, though the orange piece is thrown. I also find the geometric perfection and repetition of some of the vases quite impressive. Adler seems to be a big name in contemporary pottery and interior design. I don't know how I feel about this though. At what point does an artist become a brand name as well? Like say Jeff Kuntz or Thomas (gagging noise) Kincade for example. I guess Andy Warhol was able to, but it somehow seems more pure when he did it. Can making art and making your work a brand name coexist? Or do you sacrifice originality when your work becomes a brand? On the other hand though, maybe in the end the best critique of the commercial system is to wholeheartedly accept the system to the nth, so that your work and business practices, are, in a way, a sarcastic commentary on the commercial art market, and life in general. . .

Something that I wouldn't want to purchase

For some reason, this squirrel attack mug caught my attention. There isn't any information on who made this, but you can buy it on Amazon or ebay. I guess the idea is brilliant but creepy at the same time because you never know what's staring at you inside of the cup until you take a few sip of liquid. I would give applause to surprising me with an inanimate clay squirrel. 

Renee Iacone

Renee Iacone - Ceramic Artist

http://johndavisgallery.com/renee-iacone-2/

Kevin White - Carly Steuck

Kevin White is a ceramic artist working in Australia.  His makes vessels with contemporary embellishment that take inspiration from the East Asian ceramic tradition.  These forms feature evocative hand-painted decoration with geometric planes of colour, lustrous gold finishes and intimate decal patterning.  

Kevin has also incorporated, in his most recent work, larger sweeping brushstrokes that relate to his experience living and working in China and Japan.  His distinct signature of interpretation is clear, giving new life to the ceramic traditions and refracting ideas of Japonisme seen in British ceramics of the 19th century.

Bio on Kevin

Kevin was born in England in 1954 and arrived in Australia in 1985 upon completion of his post-graduate studies at the Royal College of Art in London.  In 1978, he was awarded a scholarship by the Japanese Ministry of Education for research into ceramics in Japan.  He lived and worked there until 1983, spending much of his time working in the studio of Satoshi Sato in Kyoto who was a member of the avant-garde ceramic group, Sodeisha.  He is currently Associate Professor and Deputy Head of International Development at RMIT University, Melbourne.  Kevin has participated in many solo and group exhibitions around Australia and overseas, and received a number of nationally and internationally recognised awards.  His work is held in collections throughout the world, including the National Gallery of Australia, Powerhouse Museum, National Gallery of Victoria, Royal College of Art (UK), Tachikichi Corporation (Japan) and the Gifu Prefectural Ceramic Museum (Japan).

Eva Funderburgh

Eva Funderburgh is a sculptor who lives in Seattle, Washington. Her range of work is broad such as bronze and clay. She makes many unknown creatures from imagination and her styles of creatures work grabbed my attention since it is cute and somehow similar with characters in Japanese Animation movies.

Kim Alsbrooks

I'm really into art that is clever, but also humorous, and Kim Alsbrook's series of paintings "My White Trash Family" does just that. She's spent the past ten years painting tiny portraits on crushed beer cans.

The combining of super traditional portraiture real historical figures on the cheapest of beers is an unexpected combination and very funny.

Its more than just humor however, her paintings are very well rendered, especially considering the difficult surface of a beer can. They also speak of serious topics, from the artist statement itself:

"The White Trash Series was developed while living in the South out of frustration with some of the prevailing ideologies, in particular, class distinction.   This ideology seems to be based on a combination of myth, biased history and a bizarre sentimentality about old wars and social structures.   With the juxtaposition of the portraits from museums, once painted on ivory, now on flattened trash like beer cans and fast food containers, the artist sets out to even the playing field, challenging the perception of the social elite in today's society."

Suzuki Goro - Carly Steuck

Suzuki Goro is a Japanese master ceramist and works in many different styles that all rooted to Japanese traditions.  One style she uses is Oribe ware, which features simples design motifs based on fanciful combination of squares, rectangles and circles.  He adds dipped or poured accents of a green flowing glaze at the end.  I find his shapes and work very detailed and the ending product always looks memorizing. 

Narumioribe Teabowl, 1999

ceramic

3.5 x 5 in.

Yobitugi with Blue Square view 2, 2009
3.75 x 5.5 in.  
Stoneware    

Shawn Spangler - Carly Steuck

Shawn Spangler

 

Shawn Spangler is from Pennsylvania and is now working and living in Hawaii.  His process includes industrial design and digital technology to create the shapes and then creates the pieces.  After he uses the same glaze in his hundreds of pieces making each one unique and interesting.  I find his process very interesting and you can learn more about it at this website here:  http://www.shawnspangler.com

 

 

Maggie Zerafa - Carly Steuck

Maggie Zerafa completed her BA at Ceramic Design at Monash University Melbourne in 1992 and then moved to Japan for a three year apprenticeship under Ryo Suzuki.  Now she creates ceramics, textiles, prints and jewelry.  Here is her work now with the influence of Japanese pottery.  Her glaze is beautiful and almost looks like an abstract painting on her work.

http://www.maggiezerafa.com/

Shōji Hamada - Carly Steuck

Shōji Hamada is a Japanese potter and was a significant influence to studio potter in the twentieth century.  His work is apart of the folk-art movement.  He studied ceramics at Tokyo Institute of Technology.  I love his take on Japanese pottery and how his work can look delicate but, yet distinct and heave with his choice of shapes and glass.  Here are a couple examples of his work.

Steve Hilton - Carly Steuck

Steve Hilton is a Geologist and Clay artist and loves the natural forms of clay, rock and soil.  He uses this in his work creating organic pottery and exaggerated ground and wall exhibits.  Here is a few examples of his work today.  He studied at Arizona State in a MFA in Ceramics in 2005.
 
His website is here : http://stevenhilton.com/Hilton_Website/Home.html
 

Title: 62,384 . . . 62,385 . . . 62,386
Series Title: Installation at Midwestern State University
Artist: Steve Hilton
Date: 2008
Technique: Plastic cast stoneware
Temperature: Cone 04
Glazing / Surface Treatment: smoke fired
Material: Stoneware
Object Type: Installation
Height: 26 | Width: 276 | Depth: 312
License: All Rights Reserved
 

Title: My Causeway
Artist: Steve Hilton
Date: 2007
Technique: Extruded
Temperature: Cone 04
Glazing / Surface Treatment: Electric Oxidation
Material: Earthenware
Object Type: Wall Piece
Height: 72 | Width: 108 | Depth: 12
License: Attribution License

 

 

Title: Conversation Over Tea (detail)
Series Title: Installation at Midwestern State University
Artist: Steve Hilton
Date: 2008
Technique: Pinch | coil
Temperature: Cone 04
Glazing / Surface Treatment: Stain
Material: Stoneware
Object Type: Installation

License: Attribution License
 

Ben Own III - Carly Steuck

 

Ben Owen III - Waterfall Bottle

 

Ben Owen is from North Carolina and is part of the Owen Family who are all pottery artist.  I thought his glaze work is amazing and I find the thin drip blue lines memorizing.  All of his pieces are focused on these different types of glaze.  Here is his website if interested in learning more.

 

 http://www.benowenpottery.com/



 

 

 

Light Gathers

Rudolf Staffel, A ceramic artist that uses porcelain as "Light Gathers". Porcelain is so transparent that it can have light shine through it kind of like a night light. Staffel was originally interested in Chinese and Japanese painting brushworks but became interested in ceramics and became an apprentice pottery. He usually doesn't paint his porcelain vessels and if he does it's just blue and green stripes. He uses lighting to share the translucency in his porcelain.

Class Time

Lately in class I have been continuing working with clay but now instead of practicing I have been working on creating things like bowls and cups, which aren't very good and need to be redone. Along with redoing those things I have also the duty of making plates which on my very first try I made a pretty good plate! I was very impressed with myself and I am getting the hang of making things on the wheel now. Everything is going great!

Michal Fargo

Michal Fargo was born and continues to work in Tel Aviv, Israel, where he has won multiple awards, competitions and scholarships. His work is driven by a variety of textures, materials and non traditional working methods and portrays the contrast between urban life and the admiration of nature. He describes that he's not necessarily after a "narrative" with his pieces, but rather the visibility and abstract feelings that may be viewed.

Celadon from Old Korea, Goryeo

This is the kettle that came out from Hang-Choi's tomb in Kang-hwa-do, Korea. It is national treasure 133 and it is created inspired by lotus blossom. Decoration is really fancy and showy. If we see closer, it also has little details of beautiful decoration and it is just impressive how ceramic artists made this kind of ceramic in beginning of 13th century. I also want to make kettle like this sometime later when I have enough skills to make one.

Sabastian Errazuriz

While I was preparing my lesson plan, I found about this artist who fashioned a series of shoes. His ideas come from his past broken relationships.I wish I could upload all of his artworks/shoes of his showcase, 12 Shoes for 12 Lovers, but I'll upload a couple of works that I like the most.