Tania Rollond is an Australian artist whose ceramics practice is built on a keen interest in drawing and mark-making. These works are from two series, a flickering moment, which exhibited at Shepparton Art Museum in 2014, and between objects and images from 2011.
“Drawings are markings in, and of, time. The small time of my day (the moment of observation captured, or the hours spent making many small pencil marks), fitting within the larger timescale of my lifetime… which is only the slightest flicker compared to the possible lifespan of a ceramic object… A scratched line or a brushstroke on clay are marks which both fix an instant, and outlive the centuries – the pot is a messenger across time.”
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Mariko Wada was born in Osaka, Japan. She has lived in Denmark since 1998.
“In recent years her works have explored the role of ceramics in a reality that is largely mediated and virtual. The special physical qualities of ceramics allow her works to heighten the appreciation of object and space respectively; two basic human anchor points that are greatly subjected to mediatory influences. By using the organic plasticity and material immediacy of ceramics, she creates works that demand physical presence…
Clay is worked directly with the hands in an intensive process that often lasts hours and days. The slow, intense working process gives ceramic objects a special immediacy. The result is not an image, but concrete, physical objects that anchor the person in a ‘here and now’ of bodiliness and sensation.” – Louise Mazanti
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Lydia Hardwick, a ceramics artist and recently Royal College of London grad has put together a very special show over on Buy Some Damn Art that I am very pleased to share with you. Hardwick works with porcelain and her abstract objects gave way for a fun conversation about “art objects”.
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Kate: What is your typical process creating these objects in porcelain?
Lydia: I use porcelain because it is very white. This means that when I mix colouring oxides and stains into it, the colours show up well. I tend to work quickly, making a lot of pieces in one go. Sometimes I squash the clay into big flat sheets, and cut out shapes to create a sort of collage. I also use porcelain a lot in its liquid form. This is called ‘slip’. I mix newspaper pulp into it, which makes it look a bit like porridge. I then pour the substance onto a surface and drop other small fragments of porcelain into it. When this dries, I might paint stained porcelain slip onto the surface. The true colours don’t emerge until the work has been fired in the kiln, so there is a lot of guesswork involved.
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Kate: These objects are a bit foreign even though they are flat and decorated on the surface like paintings. How do people interact/ respond with them?
Lydia: My brother once told me a piece of mine looked like either pizza or sick. And you know what? He was spot on! Also, I enjoyed the fact that he read the work as being many things at once. I like pieces to occupy a space of inbetweeness. I like your idea that the work seems foreign, as I suppose I try to make things that cannot quite be recognised, placed or pinned to a particular definition.
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Kate: What is an “art object” in your opinion?
Lydia: Generally, I don’t have criteria when it comes to valuing an object or surface, so this is a difficult question for me to answer. I am drawn to some things, and others I disregard, whether it is in a gallery or someone’s kitchen. Something I do value is a person’s ability to select and arrange: how they balance colour, surfaces and objects. It happens that a lot of people with this skill are involved in the creative industries. But then, I also think that the greengrocer over the road does a great job of arranging the fruit and veg.
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Kate: Have you ever considered making functional objects?
Lydia: Yes! I love things that you can do things with.
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Kate: You recently came back from two artist residencies in Scotland and Germany. What was the purpose of those stays and what did you take from them?
Lydia: Later this year I will be exhibiting at An TobarGallery on the Isle of Mull, Scotland. I was invited to take a research trip to the island in February, just to sniff the place out. My eyes were on stalks the whole trip: the place is gorgeous. Sion, the curator, told me that the island manages four seasons in one day. He was right! Both hail and blistering sunshine in the space of ten minutes. Quite soon after this visit, I headed off to Neumünster, Germany for a month residency at the Künstlerhaus Stadttöpferei. I used this time to produce a lot of work in their beautiful studios. I could walk everywhere within 10 minutes, so I think I gained at least 2 hours each day just by not travelling like I do in London. The way that I think about time definitely shifted after this experience. I was blown away by the generosity of the people in this town.
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Kate: What excites you most about the future?
Lydia: I am always excited about the prospect of coffee, wine, eating and walking.
Akio Takamori is a widely-recognized artist originally from Japan, now based in Seattle. I love Judith Schwartz‘ description of his sculptures as “loose billowy puffs of clay seeming to encapsulate air.” These figures all share the same illusion – that they’re made of something else besides ceramics. It is also intriguing that Takamori makes a habit of showing asian figures in historical European clothing full of pomp and presige.
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Images via Kunstforum, Ferrin Gallery, and James Harris Gallery.
Tania Rollond was a finalist in 2011 for the Vitrify Alcorso Ceramic Award for her lovely, painterly work in ceramics below.
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Sculptures in Love with Architecture by Fabio Fernandez and Tom Lauerman.
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via Sight Unseen.
