John Zotosis a Dallas-based art critic
and essayist who has written widely on
modern and contemporary art. In
addition to covering Dallas forart ltd.
and Visual Art Source, his articles have
appeared in numerous publications in-
cluding ArtNexus, Art Lies, NY Arts
Magazine, and Art & Culture Texas. He
recently completed a catalogue essay
on the photographer Dornith Doherty for
the University of North Texas Press and
the Houston Center for Photography.18 art ltd - March / April 2016editor’s note
art ltd.®magazine is published bimonthly by RIK Design, Inc.Subscriptions are available at
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Copyright ©2015 RIK Design, Inc. All rights reserved. Printed in U.S.A. (ISSN-1941-8558)
Contemporary ceramics. 21st century ceramics. However you phrase it,
it still feels a tad subversive. Perhaps that’s because of ceramics’ age. Leav-
ing out cave painting (which has frankly gone out of vogue the last few
centuries and is rarely taught in graduate programs), ceramics remains
the most venerable of art mediums still in use. Thus, modern adherents
of the medium have always had to work all the harder to dispel the aura
of mustiness or functionality (or, gasp, Craft!) that stubbornly clung to it. One
got the sense the other, younger mediums were just slightly embarrassed
by the way ceramics kept hanging around, like some cousin from the Old
Country, who was genial and good with their hands, who served delicious
soups and stews, but still spoke with a subtle accent, and who wasn’t al-
ways welcomed to the party when the trendy insiders were invited over.
“We’ll be having Absolut, and artisan cheeses and – oh Ceramics! You’re
here, too? You brought a bowl? Oh, great. Put it over there.”
Well I hate to break it to you, but ceramics is now the hip one in the room.
It’s lost some weight and has a whole new look, and in fact, is crazy
promiscuous with all the other mediums. That’s right: after how many
thousands of years, ceramics is finally cutting loose. Maybe even going
a little crazy. Perhaps it’s just a middle-age thing. After all, it was just over
fifty years ago that Peter Voulkos had his solo show at LACMA (April
1965), and nearly fifty (November 1966) that John Mason opened his;
aptly, both shows were titled “Sculpture.” It was also in 1966 (July) that
Ken Price exhibited at LACMA, in a two-person show with Robert Irwin.
While Price’s work in many ways laid the egg for the abstract sculptural
medium of today, in its embryonic form, as it grew to break free of its ves-
sel-like shell, Mason, too, made an indelible mark. His big Red Xof 1966,
a blockish crimson ‘X’ form standing nearly 5 by 5 feet, which was subse-
quently bought by LACMA and which remains on view, streaked and
cracking, but defiantly monolithic, seems in retrospect to boldly declare
“You Are Here” on the map of ceramic history, marking the time and
place (California in the mid-‘60s) that the medium came into its own.
Of course, the very word “clay” implies a certain flexibility, and today’s
clay is nothing if not adaptable. Beyond the hybrid crossovers with diverse
mediums (and technologies), increasingly it is being looked at anew by
conceptual artists who are more interested in what the medium can do
than in adapting its traditions. Yet whatever its associations, clay remains
a resolutely tactile, physical medium. You shape it with your hands, engage
it with your body. So perhaps in its way, today’s mini-clay-resurgence is
a reaction to the digital, virtual, online ‘space’ in which we ever more fre-
quently spend (waste?) our time. (Click here to move on to the next item
in our ceramics Top Twenty list! Number 17 will shock you!). With this
issue, we look at ceramics in a variety of ways, soliciting thoughts on the
state of the medium from several leading ceramic artists and educators.
We also review the Scripps Ceramic Annual (its 72nd), spotlight the
NCECA conference in Kansas City (its 50th), and profile Seattle’s George
Rodriguez and LA’s Julia Haft-Candell, who are each putting their own
singular mark on this singularly mutable medium. FWIW, there are still
other, excellent ceramic shows in LA that opened after this issue was
assigned, among them the bountiful sculptural bouquets of David Hicks
at Edward Cella, and a career survey of ceramic pioneer Ken Price to
inaugurate LA’s new Parrasch Heijnen Gallery. The sense of almost
biological abundance and fecundity in these works is reflective of the
overall state of the art. As venerable, and earthbound, as it is, today
the medium of clay seems to be pushing forward in a hundred different
directions, while embracing its sexy new hybrid identity as the new
normal. If only the rest of us could age with that much flair.
—GEORGE MELROD
contributors
James Yood teaches modern
and contemporary art history
and criticism at the School of
the Art Institute of Chicago, where
he also directs its New Arts
Journalism program. Regional
correspondent and art critic for
Artforum, he has also written
regularly for Art and Auction,
teme celeste, GLASSmagazine
and visualartsource.com.Neil Thrunis an artist, writer and critic
based in Kansas City. In the past, his
criticism and journalism have been
featured in the Kansas City Star, Huff-
ington Postand various online blogs
and print zines. Currently, he is a regu-
lar contributor to KC Studio Magazine.
He graduated from the Kansas City Art
Institute in 2010 with a degree in
painting.“Glow,” 2013
Rebecca Campbell
Oil on canvas, 65" x 90"
Photo: courtesy of Susan and
Peter Lizotte, the artist
and LA LouverShana Nys Dambrotis an art critic,
curator, and author based in
Los Angeles. She is currently LA Editor
for WhiteHot Magazine, Arts Editor for
Vs. Magazine, and a contributor to the
LA Weekly, Flaunt, and KCET’s Art-
bound. She studied Art History at Vassar
College, and besides all the magazine
stuff, she writes books and exhibition
catalogues, curates one or two
exhibitions a year, and speaks in public
with alarming frequency.cover