4A. A revised post addressing how a theme or theory we discussed in this course relates to your practice.

I'm supposed to write here more about how our studies relate to our own art. Since I've already discussed the relationship to our studies the first half of the semester I'll try here to relate to our study in the second half of the semester, which has been largely on site, fieldwork, and location.

What this means is that the manner in which I present my art work and its location contribute to its aesthetic and interpretation. Currently I display my artwork in galleries and will have some in the Hallie Ford Museum during the senior art show. Because my work is not shown out-of-doors I find it difficult to address the theories about outdoor spaces affecting my work. Instead I will focus on how the indoor space of a gallery affects my work. I place both descript and non-descript art in shows, usually in the form of paintings and ceramic wall hangings.  By hanging the work on the wall I am elevating it's importance and making you look at it as an equal. The viewer has to involve themselves under controlled conditions of light and view at a distance that pulls them into a relationship with the art. This requires them to share the same space and alter it with their presence. The outside world cannot insert itself in the experience and I control what the viewer can see. The mood will be the one that I choose and is difficult to reinterpret. The viewer may choose to accept or reject the mood I have created with my art, but the only way they can change it is through their own philosophy about what is represented. If they participate in interpreting the art they will insert themselves somehow.

My work is not monumental, and I do not put my sculptures on a pedestal, but rather I hang it in front of the viewer for them to interpret as a more tangible and equal object. Because the work is not monumentalized its function is nomadic and it depicts its own reference.  It is almost homeless because you have nothing to relate it to but itself and a bare wall with lights. Because it is transportable the viewer may take the work to her own place and imagine it included there, in some sort of idealist place.
Or the viewer may exclude the art from his world and choose to limit its influence. The viewer gets to choose, in some regard, how important to make the art. If it were monumentalized and permanently installed in a location that the viewer must interact with, the viewer would have to interact and the art would be an architectural feature in their world. This is more of a cultural situation and would expand the world of the viewer.

My art would not easily qualify as relational art because of its portability. But should a viewer purchase it and take it home to install it in a semi-permanent location they would be making it relational art. In relational art the authorship and audience become more important and gain a social aspect because the audience participates with the art.

Even in the gallery a critic could spend time with my art critiquing it for relationships. In pieces like my "Tea Time" and "Coffee Time" (see below) a critic could discuss either isolation or sharing. In something like my untitled clay tiles or flowers (below) a critic might expand into meanings of society, patterns, repetition, individuality, or seductiveness. Using these expansive ideas the art takes the viewer into an expanded field of influence.

Coffee Time, 2011, Acrylic on Canvas, 9"x12"

Tea Time, 2011, Acrylic on Canvas, 9"x12"

Poppy, 2011, Ceramic, 5" diameter

Unfinished, 2011, Ceramic, 5" tiles

Elevator Talk

This assignment was to post a copy of our elevator speech/talk.  I wrote this:

Hi, I’m Bonnie Balogh. I am a contemporary ceramic artist. I like working with clay because it makes me feel like I am a part of nature. I am an idealist and choose to reflect on growth, spirit, and relationships by modeling shapes that reflect patterns, society, and the expectations of others. My current theme is a social commentary on controlling and repetitive structures in society, and the stagnation they can cause. I believe societies can cause a group-think of oppressive rules and I feel controlled by them. Patterns are visually seductive so I use them to represent society, and then I insert an element that is different to juxtapose the pattern and represent my breaking free from the rules. The viewer has to decide what is more important, the seductive pattern or the individual element. 

Photo assignment

This week our assignment was to do a random act assigned by an artist.  Mine was to cut a rose and give it to a stranger.  Here is my picture doing this.  Nice lady deserved a flower, but I found this assignment to be an unfullfilling time-waster. I hope there are no more assignments like this.  Where is the art?

Influences Map

This weeks assignment was to create a map of our artistic influences and post it on our blog.  I didn't like doing this because it is nobody else's business why I do what I do and I don't want to put it out there for others to judge. I didn't realize how strongly I felt about this until we were reviewing our assignment in class. I unintentionally picked the crappiest piece of paper I had, and though we were asked to use pencil I didn't care that it was hard to read.  And as I heard others tell what influenced them I realized some of those things could go on my map too, but I didn't think to add them while I was fighting with myself about what was "safe" to write down. I feel pretty strongly about telling others what influences me, because I don't want to be told what to think or do.  I don't mind listening to other perspectives and choosing what works for me, but I know that naming something is giving it power and I don't want to give others power over me.

I also realize the reason I really don't like to blog and don't want to have one is because I feel so strongly that I am not safe when I divulge my innermost thoughts. For the longest time no one has cared what the heck I think anyway.  Why should I waste my time writing down things no one reads or responds to? I'd rather be making art.  That is something people respond to. Only a few people have earned my trust and are truly interested in my words.

I have had a web site for several months that I post my art images to and my husband blogs on. We get about 16 hits a day on it and in as many months neither one of us has had so much as one response or email from the site.  (Yes, we tested it by emailing ourselves.)  I feel like blogging is a big waste of time. I don't follow any blogs except for this class, and it seems like no one interacts much here either.  Hmm. If you are out there reading this and want to prove to me that I am wrong and blogging is being read, I invite you to post a comment on this site.  :)

Here is the map.  It is the best image I could get with my 10 megapix camera, a flash, and sharpening the image in Photoshop. TTFN.

Contemplations on my work related to the body.

            In exploring how my work relates with categories for debating the body in contemporary art I will examine: 1) performance art; 2) minimalism; 3) aesthetics; 4) post-structuralist rendering of the disciplined body; 5) abject art; 6) aesthetic enactment of the disappearing, vanishing body; and 7) the Cyborg. My work may fit into a few of these considerations because manipulating clay is very physical and tactile. I relate my creations to myself, and therefore my body, because I am depicting how I differ in form, from the shapes around me.

            I suppose I could stretch my imagination to relate clay art to performance art. A certain amount of my physical action is required to pound the clay into the correct smoothness to create with. Beating and mashing the clay repeatedly is a way to show how I generate outcomes. My presence is manifest through these actions.

            Minimalism is in my work when I use a non-representational form like a ceramic spiral to represent myself. The viewer must come up with their own consideration about what this form means.  A body without a familiar form requires contemplation and cannot be categorized.  I can manipulate negative space and cause the viewer to think about my absence as well as my presence. The spiral might mean I continue indefinitely or it may mean I am waiting to be resurrected. It could also mean I am stuck in an infinite cycle.

            Clay is always a very aesthetic presence. People want to touch it and seek out the tactile shapes in their perfection or imperfection.  I incorporate textures into my work to invite viewers to touch them. To feel clay the viewer must feel the earth and their mortality, because we all serve the earth, even as compost. To think of clay you will eventually come to realize you will return to it someday.  And so, then, in every one of my clay artworks is a tiny bit of our history, our humanity. Bringing clay to forms of artwork is bringing people back to life, in a new form, and incorporating the fragmented bodies of others. Clay is how we all embrace death and then become immortal.

            I often think of the aesthetic enactment of the disappearing, vanishing body by deconstructing rules of gender. I like to make goddess figures that remind me of female power. My spiral shapes also relate to the feminist notions of modern day goddess worshipers by embodying the spiral dance of life. I give women the same (if not greater) power as men and perpetuate female empowerment by allowing my spirals to interrupt the patterns and oppressive molds of society. I increase female power by increasing the size and displacement caused by my spiral shapes.

            I’m pretty sure I don’t use abject art models in my work. I don’t like and purposely avoid images of the body that are revolting and disgusting. The closest I can come to relating to this type of work is the occasional passing thought that an extrusion of clay resembles a turd. I quickly remedy this and move on.

            When people look at my artwork and don’t understand or care to contemplate it they are treating it like the enactment of the vanishing body.  It is painful to be invisible, so I craft my pieces to have as much impact as possible. Yet there will always be those who don’t give a damn about it. I suppose if I wanted to embrace the concept and enact the vanishing body I could leave clay in an untouched heap so it would be as unimportant as the dirt that it is. I’m sure many people would walk by and not even contemplate the value of a lump of earth, or distain my work as meaningless.  If they only thought about it, that earth is the body, immortalized.

            Last, in considering the Cyborg, or expanded humanity, we have to consider that clay, being minerals, can withstand the rigors of space and is the ultimate vehicle of our immortality.  No one remains an individual once they return to the earth. Every particle of us is eventually transformed back into clay.  Minerals are the foundation for our modern technology and are the building blocks for computers and artificial body parts.  In that way we all return from clay to functioning parts of humanity again without ever having a biological rebirth. So my clay creations are immobile cyborgs waiting to be recast into new humanity.

Artist Statement, Revision 3

The feedback I received basically suggested I drop the first few sentences of my prior artist statement, so, here is the revision:

As a ceramic artist I shape clay, and it brings me a spiritual connection to the earth. My earliest recollections of making art were modeling Play Doh, and the oldest piece of my art that survives is my pre-school handprint in clay. I’ve always loved creating dimensional, textural, and playful art. My favorite art themes are related to youthful pleasures with purposeful references to patterns and growth. The process of working with clay embodies nature and makes me feel I am a part of it. I am an idealist and choose to reflect on growth, spirit, and relationships by modeling shapes that reflect patterns, society, and the expectations of others. Societies tend to create a group-think and impose repeating patterns of behavior. These patterns may not appear problematic at first, but as they multiply they become rigid, take over, and I feel controlled by them. I purposefully juxtapose patterns with interruptions that make a contrast. I like interrupting, emerging from, or displacing patterns to break free and create a new focal point. 

My technique is to sculpt and hand-build my ceramic art pieces using rolled slabs, stacked coils, or pinched chunks of clay. I create patterns by molding the clay into shapes (sometimes with an extruding device), pressing it with stamps, or applying a combination of dark and light colored stoneware. Sometimes I emphasize a texture or translucent effect by constructing my artwork with porcelain. I highlight and apply visual importance with colored slips and glazes. 

Artist statement example by Ginger Steele

Not all artists have extensive statements so here is an artist statement from a Northwest artist whos work I admire, Ginger Steele:

Ginger Steele            http://www.insomniapottery.com/artist.html 

From the Artist

Inspired by the beautiful surfaces and subtle colors of salt-fired pottery, I built my own salt kiln in 2004. After ten years of creating highly decorated red earthenware pottery, I wanted to bring a quieter and more abstract sensibility to the work.

Each piece is individually shaped at the potter's wheel or formed by hand, decorated with slips and glazes after a bisque fire, and then perched on tiny balls of refractory wadding before placement in the kiln. The bottom of each vessel shows the mark its passage through the fire and vapor. With every firing there are new possibilities for learning; chance combinations of clay, slip, and glaze that can be incorporated into the design of the next series of pots.

The unpredictable collaboration of salt vapor and kiln position makes each pot unique and reveals extraordinary possibilities for color and imagery that are artistic nourishment for a working potter.