June 30, 2003
Ceramic Pot
This 18x20" unglazed ceramic pot includes a quote from the Leo Marx book, "The Machine in the Garden". The quote is set in between HTML tags and individually letterpressed into the clay before firing, so each letter is a relief of about 1.8". The book examines the difference between the "pastoral" and "progressive" ideals of 19th-century American culture. I chose this quote because of its mention of the steam engine and the unintended yet somewhat anachronistic humor in that the steam engine could be substituted for many technologies debated in our society today.
Part of my work as an MFA student investigates the means by which cultures represent their past and the technologies they use to do so. Ceramics have been a telling artifact of cultures for thousands of years. Taking the artifact of the pot, I was interested in looking at it through the lens of historians who may or may not have an understanding of our language of the world wide web, as we know it. The language of HTML is not one that we speak, but it facilitates communication nonetheless. Here, it is integrated into the pot as a vehicle for preserving one of the technologies of our time.
June 12, 2003
Ceramic Coasters
This is a collection of coasters containing words that have been letterpressed into the clay while moist. The objective of this project was to create a set of coasters that might be used as conversation starters at a dinner party or social gathering, in order to stimulate human to human interaction. Words such as Alive, Sex, Kiss, Moon, and Rain are open-ended enough to spark conversation. They could also be used in a similar fashion to wine-glass tags that use words to jog the memory when someone puts their drink down and walks away momentarily. A light coat of glaze on top prevents moisture from seeping all the way through the clay.