CCACA Post:

CCACA Post:

Post images of your work. Include name, title, medium.
one sentence description of each piece.

Write a 300-350 word response to a lecture that you attended at CCACA. Please bring in outside sources to fill in if needed. Cover what was interesting about this artist practice? Include some biographical information and some technical information. 

Post 5 images of other artist work with a one sentence description about what you find interseting about that work.

Provisional Geologies

Provisional Geologies 1, Logan Lape
wood, clay, clamps

Provisional Geologies 1, Logan Lape
wood, clay, clamps

Provisional Geologies 2, Logan Lape
wood, clay, clamps

The Provisional Geologies pieces were the starts of series utilizing the formation process of geological features--mountains, valleys, terrain--as a vocabulary for acts of attraction, connection, love and lust. The scale of the created landscapes in a physical and timely sense allow me to begin to touch on thoughts of temporality and impermanence. The incorporation of the process into the display of the works emphasizes the importance of force acted upon the clay material over the resulting object. An event has occurred leaving the viewer only with a residue or clue as to the act.

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Other work at the conference

Unknown title/artist (Ship. steel, glass, ceramic) Chico State
Source: Huffington Post

The large, steel ship-like installation at the Chico State exhibition commanded a space and my attention better than most work I saw at the conference. The hanging of the steel and implied shape from the ribbing presented very cleanly and the exposure of the makeup of those "ribs" through the fallen/broken section forced me to mentally interact with the materials with an exciting sense of mystery.

Arranged Degradation No. 2, Michael T. Hurley (website)
Chico State

Hurley's use of specimen-like arrangements of crosscut earth formations intrigued me. I found his depictions of entropy or frozen states of decay (degradation) to function very successfully.

From a series of cups with secrets at the CCA show

So 1) not this particular cup and 2) take the moment to love that I stole this from Instagram because I had no photo myself.

What I enjoyed about these mugs was the accompanying text that explained the pricing structure and how the embedded content affected the value of these otherwise near identical objects. It was nice to see a project incorporating a social element and the play on commodity with the cups was the right amount of funny.

"Drum", "Guitar", "Drum"
Sean Leahy

Alright not to get myself in trouble playing favorites in-house, by Sean's setup just felt near flawless. The shift put in place by the "found" objects made the piece and provided a powerful context for them to exist in. +1 for funny but not a one-liner.


The work as a whole at the Southern Oregon University show just felt like smart experimentation and a refreshing, forward was of thinking about clay as a medium. I enjoyed the delicateness of much of the work as well as the interactivity and intricateness of some of the works.

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Clayton Keyes

What impressed me throughout Keyes’ lecture was the way in which he navigated through utilizing politicized content in ways that were still, as his statement says, human and relatable. I think Keyes and the work approach these ideas through a route of caring and concern for the human condition that I find very approachable.

The work consists primarily of figurative sculptures at life- and half-size. The surface treatment of the figures is notable; smooth, waxy textures that can appear very fleshy and soft or rough and scaly. A piece from the presentation that stuck with me was Arrival. Drawing from the photo-based works of Brandon Ballengee who has been documenting the deformations found in frogs due to pollution, Keyes’ created a newborn form mirroring the mutations found in the amphibian specimens. This making of what can be dismissed as a non-human problem into an unignorable human form brings up for me the exact emotional response his statement addresses: “to impress upon the viewer the experiences of the oppressed and to draw from them empathy for such.” Other work from this series, Legacy, address the future to be faced by the children of the current generation. What environment are we leaving them and what repercussions must they face for their inheritance? Throughout this part of the presentation I thought about the role of science fiction a few times. Insomuch that sci-fi ultimately brings forth moral situations to help ensure a better future for humanity. Can what we make have that power? What is the power of visual experience? I feel that Keyes’ believes that his work does have this ability and that faith is shown through the treatment and commitment to the figures.

 

I find myself trying to relate this back the The New Aesthetic Tumblr blog (http://new-aesthetic.tumblr.com/) and it’s “material which points towards new ways of seeing the world, an echo of the society, technology, politics and people that co-produce them.” While Keye’s focus can be more on the personal or physical, the missions to bring about visionary awareness are similar.

sean Leahy

Lisa Clague’s work between subconscious And intangible.  Her figurative hybrid creatures represent personalitiys from characters in her dreams. these characters may evoke fear or joyfulness, playfulness, ect. The figure that represents her duaghter if often a sock doll monkey that has been dipped in slip. her figures represent a passageway between what is dreamt what is lived what is remembered and what is to come.  These figures are a direct response to personal experiences. An example, if she went into work and was feeling unhappy he would make the piece unhappy.  She uses art to investigate both her inner and outer life, by doing so she creates space for increased self knowledge and transformation.  Her art really showed great improvement after her first experience with hallucinogenic mushrooms. That Is when she figured out that see needed to base her art after that weird world that comes from what is real what one may think is real and how far the mind can expand with a little help and a lot of thought.  I learned a few cool technics from lisa. One being if you want to make a concrete pillow, just fill a zip lock bag with cement and let it dry. Another, to make clay look like metal or bronze by covering it with graphite. She dips porcellin dolls in slips and adds makes to them and fires them to create some of her figures. 

"Drum", "Guitar", "Drum"

Sean Leahy

Cone 6 soldade, Goat skins, twin, lawn  chair, Cone 10 soda, guitar strings, cone 6 soldate, Budweiser

CCACA 2013

Above: Aggression 

Clay, Wood, Mineral Oil

Below: The Big Pull

Clay, Wood, Bailing Wire, Chicken Wire, Rope

Below/Left: Surrender

Clay, Wood, Bailing Wire, Mineral Oil

Since I met him last year and fell in love with his techniques, I had to see Clayton Keyes present again. His way of creating figurative sculpture, seemingly effortlessly is amazing to me, each stroke makes just one more body part.  That is what I am trying to accomplish with my work as well, just in a different way.  Clayton works solely hollow when he builds his pieces, I tend to work solid.  
I wanted to delve into emotion more, if you are a figurative creator then emotion is everything. I want to further explore how Clayton captures the rich emotions in his work.  It goes back to the deep conceptual thinking that he does for each piece. Each piece is bursting with emotional significance, like the pieces below. You can feel the sincerity in each piece and the weight of the emotion hanging on your own shoulder. 
He says, "My sculpture tells stories that are human, relatable, and strive to leave some trace on the viewer through communicating an emotional narrative."   He inspires me to push further with my concepts and execution.  I love watching Clayton work, as I formerly stated, he moves effortlessly with clay and his very few tools. When he was working on his piece at CCACA, just one swipe of his rubber rib, and there appeared a torso, it simply amazes he how in tune with anatomy he is. Each piece I have seen is perfectly measured and each figure has a uniqueness to it that i am fascinated with.  I look forward to seeing him again, and delving deeper into his tactics and skills. 

My CCACA Experience

My Work:

                                                         Piece 1: Stan Lee the Demon

Porcelain ^6 with Underglazes

(w/ broken rail road ties [at CCACA])

Piece 2: Ugg Lee

Hanging Piece - Porcelain ^10 Soda Fired

My wall & Piece 3: Suspension (hanging on left side)

Porcelain ^10 Soda Fired, mixed media

Artist Lecture:

One artist's lecture that I attended at CCACA and found really interesting was Lisa Clague's. Clague presented a lot of information and went into depth about her personal history and how it corresponds to her work. This helped me understand her intentions and meanings behind each piece. Clague focuses a lot on the human and animal form which already intrigued me before I knew much about her.

Clague started with an introduction about her past and her life as a child growing up with two artists for parents. She explained how her mother was a ceramicist and her father created metal sculptures. Clague pointed this out as being a driving force that at first kept her away from working in either ceramics or metal. Clague also stated how there were a few major life events that has helped inspire and push her work. Some of these life altering events was the loss of her boyfriend and her experience with psychedelic mushrooms. She noted these as having great impact even to this day. Clague went more into detail concerning her mushroom trip and how she can now lucid dream which she has used as inspiration since her experience. Two other life altering events for Clague was the birth of her daughter and the death of her father. Clague mentioned that the use of three heads often helped embody herself as well as her daughter. She also described each animal as being completely unique as to what impact they are supposed to have emotionally. They are basically used as tools of personification to show traits and characteristics.

Another thing I found really interesting about Clague was her use of fabrics and stuffed animals to conjure up additions to her pieces. She explained how she uses sock monkeys, beanie babies, and other stuffed animals dipped in slip and fired to create these figures because she said she focuses too much on a refined form that she could not successfully make something like a child's toy look correct. I really like her use of these third party objects in her pieces and I feel that this is something that I should explore sometime soon. Clague also explained her use of metal in her work and how it can interact and add to each piece.

All in all, I found Lisa Clague's lecture to be extremely eye-opening as to what can be done with ceramics. I had not heard of some of her practices before and I believe I can push my work further now as well, by exploring different mediums mixed with clay.

Lisa Clague: Titillation

5 Other Works:

 Piece 1: Truck                                                             Piece 2:Plates

       Piece 3: Baby

Piece 5: Abstract figures                                                                   Piece 4: Metal-like slabs

*I messed up and didn't get the name of any of these they were at the Humboldt show though. Except for Guy's dead baby in our space.
 Piece 1:  I like the high detail and well carried out craft of the truck.
Piece 2 :  I would like to explore intricate glazing and patterns sometime in the future like these plates.
Piece 3: Guy's baby from L.T.C.C.  I like that he included a pretty strong narrative. I want to explore more narrative.
Piece 4: I really like how these came out. I don't know how they did it but I'm really interested in the finish on the surface.
Piece 5:  These figures just reminded me of things out of the hip-hop world; Something that revolves around music.  I like the glazing and the overall large structure.

*Overall, CCACA was an awesome time and I would love to go back again!

Electric Lazer Worm

     
"Electric Lazer Worm" 

(Left):  Acrylic on ^06 stoneware inside cardboard box.

(Right):  Low fire glow-in-the-dark glaze on ^06 stoneware inside cardboard box.

              

Lisa Clague

At the 25^th annual California Conference for the Advancement of Ceramic Arts (CCACA) I chose to audit the lecture by Lisa Clague.  Lisa’s presentation was broken down to here four stages of inspiration: the death of her college boyfriend, her first time experiencing psychedelic mushrooms, the birth of her daughter, and the death of her father.  While these were her 4 major sources of inspiration, she demonstrated a wide variety of technical skills and knowledge of both ceramic and metal mediums. 

Clague’s early work was focused mostly on illustrations due to the fact that she did not want to follow in her parents’ footsteps (her father being a metal worker and her mother a ceramicist).  However in her schooling she was forced to take a ceramics class where she made mostly pots.  When it came time for her to do her BFA show the medium she chose was clay.  From there her work transitioned into more human like forms following her experience on psychedelic mushrooms.  She spoke of however since her trip, she has been able to lucid dream and that has been the source of most of her work to follow.  Human like figures with multiple heads covered in animal masks became her focus.  And with the birth of her daughter the works became self-portraits of the two of them.  As her daughter grew older Lisa began to pull inspiration from her toys.  She would dip monkey sock puppets in slip, then alter their forms creating creepy collage like works, one of her works was an orgy of slip covered stuffed animals. 

However she never strayed away from her animal faced figures.  She showed examples of how she makes the human faces and the masks separately which allowed her to use either doll eyes or taxidermy goat eyes.  Her mastery of her material did not end there as she showed slides of porcelain figurines found at the thrift store that she had combined with the heads of Beanie Baby’s and dipped in slip to create a singular piece.  She even began to take some of her older works and spray them down with hairspray and rub graphite to give them a bronze appearance.  However in her current works, she is shifting more towards using clay and leaving all the other mediums out of her work.  Due to the poor economy, she has been making just the heads so she can make more and sell them at lower costs. 

A master of many materials, Lisa Clague’s talk about the evolution of her work and the techniques that got her there was most defiantly a highlight of the 25^th CCACA.  Her work can be seen in person at the John Natsoulas Center for the Arts in downtown Davis, CA. 

Lisa Clague

   Heath Pierson 

heathpierson.com

  

Michael Ballew

                         

 Eric Burden

Flor Widmar