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Art

Porcelain Dishware Covered with Marine Life by Mary O’Malley

New York-based artist Mary O’Malley (previously) continues her fantastic amalgamations of porcelain dishware encrusted with ocean life titled Bottom Feeders. Like any object resting on the ocean floor, her sculptures have become increasingly swarmed by flora and fauna over the years, with some of her most recent pieces appearing wholly consumed by coral, seaweed, crustaceans, and tentacles. O’Malley creates everything you see by hand, the teapots and other dishes are thrown and hand-built porcelain, to which she adds sculpted wildlife coated with red iron oxide. You can see more of her recent work on Facebook and Instagram.

Art

Concentrically Layered Ceramic Sculptures and Vessels by Matthew Chambers

When stopping to consider these masterful ceramic objects by artist by Matthew Chambers, a flood of familiar images came to mind as I tried to understand what I was looking at. The aperture of a camera, the protective shell of a curled up armadillo, ocean waves, bowls of pasta, or portals to other dimensions; all valid reactions to these hand-built ceramic vessels and sculptures that contain dozens of thin concentric layers.

For the last 8 years Chambers has been working from a 215 square foot studio in Newport on the Isle of Wight where he creates each piece without the aid of sketches or designs, preferring to experiment as he works. Each “layer” is an individual section thrown on a potter’s wheel which he then assembles with other layers to make a solid sculpture. How something so precisely geometric can be formed from clay by hand is nothing short of astounding.

Chambers most recently had work at New Craftsman Gallery, and you can read a studio visit from Ceramic Arts Daily.

 

Art

Hand-Built Porcelain Sculptures by Nuala O’Donovan Mimic Fractal Patterns Found in Nature

Irish artist Nuala O’Donovan sculpts intricate hand-built porcelain forms that resemble fractal patterns found in nature. Borrowing from shapes found in coral, teasel flowers, and pine cones, O’Donovan examines not only patterns, but irregularities that arise from random or unexpected events. From her artist statement:

The result of using the characteristics of fractal geometry in making decisions regarding the form of the sculptural pieces, is that the form is resolved but retains a sense of potential change. The viewer engages with the piece by allowing their own visual experiences to influence their view of the outcome of the form and its future possibilities. I hope that this aspect of my work also evokes the transitory quality of living organisms, combining traces of history, the present and the future, in the patterns that make up their surfaces and forms.

O’Donovan most recently exhibited with Tansey Contemporary at SOFA Chicago and has numerous exhibitions around the UK in 2015. You can see much more on her Facebook page and Instagram. Photos by Sylvain Deleu and Janice O’Connell.

 

Art

Forms of Nature Created from Thousands of Ceramic Shards by Zemer Peled

Israeli artist Zemer Peled explores both the beauty and brutality of nature with sculptures constructed from ceramic shards. The pieces billow and bloom like flowers or sea creatures, taking color from Peled’s use of blue cobalt found in designs and landscapes used in traditional Japanese pottery. The artist uses a slab roller to build sheets of clay which are fired and then smashed to pieces with a hammer, providing a contrast between smooth and soft materials that go into each piece.

Peled was recently shortlisted for the Young Masters Art Prize which opens today Sphinx Fine Art in London, and she’s currently a long term resident at the Archie Bray Foundation. You can see much more of her work in her portfolio.

 

Art

New Vintage Porcelain Dishes Crawling with Hand-Painted Ants by Evelyn Bracklow

German artist Evelyn Bracklow of La Philie has created an entire new collection of ant-covered porcelain dishes and tableware since we first shared her work here early this year. Many of the new pieces are part of a unique partnership between the artist, Rijks Museum in the Netherlands, and Etsy. The pieces are hand-painted in Bracklow’s studio, signed, numbered and fired to 160 degrees. As unsettling as having insects permanently invading your dinnerware is, I can’t help but be enchanted by how perfectly crafted they are. You can see more of Bracklow’s recent work here.

 

Art

Landscapes Sculpted into Layered Antique Dinner Plates by Caroline Slotte

Helsinki-based artist Caroline Slotte manipulates artwork found on acquired antique ceramics to create layered landscapes and isolated images. One of her most striking bodies of work titled Landscape Multiple involves a process of carving and sanding through stacked dinner plates to create new, unexpected landscapes. From her artist statement:

The reworking of second hand objects play a pivotal role in Caroline Slotte´s practice. She manipulates found materials, primarily ceramic everyday items, so that they take on new meanings. The tensions between the recognizable and the enigmatic, the ordinary and the unexpected are recurring thematic concerns. More recent explorations reveal an expanded interest in material perception and material recognition, teasing out situations where the initial visual identification fails resulting in an unsettling state of material confusion. Demonstrating an engaged sensitivity towards the associations, memories and narratives inherent in the objects, Slotte´s intricate physical interventions allows us to see things we would otherwise not have seen.

What you see here is just a sample of Slotte’s work, head over to her website to see all of these pieces close up, and also check out her wood sculptures. Slotte had several additional pieces on view earlier this year at Kunstnerforbundet Gallery in Oslo. (via Yellowtrace)