Ceramic Arts Commons^™

A New Perspective

DePaul Magazine

The DePaul Art Museum foregrounds inclusiveness, partnership and social justice to reframe the role of cultural institutions.

Uncanny Bodies, Samantha Neu

MFA in Visual Art

In “Uncanny Bodies,” unseemly bits are revealed, sensibilities are questioned, and solid ground morphs into shaky mounds. I delve into how the uncanny challenges traditional views and societal norms about the body. My artwork emphasizes the fluid and often unsettling experiences of physical existence, blurring the boundaries between personal and collective perceptions. Through distortions and manipulation of scale, the familiar is rendered alien in my sculptures, prints, and paintings. Through this ambiguity, I hope to offer space for the viewer to navigate their body’s emotional and physical relationship to the unknown.

Raisin Fingers, Sophia Hatzikos

Graduate School of Art Theses

I am a sculptor that uses site reactive interactions, video documentation, and studio-based processes to explore landscape. I investigate my multifaceted relationship of self to my sensorial memory of landscape. Through themes of memory, loss and longing intertwined with my personal connection to water. I identify the intersections of sculpture and landscape seeking ways in which environments shapes decisions in the making process.

Through case studies of two distinct landscapes, Malaki and Tyson, I look at how these environments serve as sources of inspiration and material for experimentation. By identifying the ways in which I researched at each site respectively …

Családi, Joelle Nagy

LSU Master's Theses

Családi (Magyar/Hungarian) adjective: related to the family; related to the home

CSALÁDI is a compendium of paintings and sculpture that narrate and itemize memories, mementos, and feelings from my childhood in relation to the home. It is an autobiographical agglomeration of objects and spaces that I am honoring and remembering through the act of creating. I am effectuating the feminine and maternal instinct of gathering and arranging my memories pertaining to personal history and inherited cultural identity through altar-making. Idiosyncratic items are collected and bound through color association and sensory memory. Constructing interior and exterior spaces of the home in …

Waste Illuminates Worlds: Printed Modular Lamp Design Based On Brick And Clay Tile, Yechen Zhu

Masters Theses

The building industry in the New England area is often in a state of entropy, with abandoned brick buildings contributing to urban decay. The recycling rate of brick and clay tile wastes generated by construction and demolition is only 12.2%, meaning the majority is sent to landfills. The expansion of landfills can lead to significant environmental and community challenges, including increased traffic from waste transport, habitat destruction, ecosystem degradation, and contributions to climate change. Specifically, the Bethlehem landfill in New Hampshire, which is planned to undergo a 5.71-acre lateral expansion through 2026, has already encountered issues such as leachate spills …

Space Between: Navigating Openness, Torie Stotz

Masters Theses

In a predominantly human-made, constructed world, I am exploring how I can manifest the natural world with a hand made screen divider system, based on form and structure, that replicates that of a work of nature, more specifically simulating dappled light. Questioning sustainability through the limitations of terracotta clay, while introducing a passive, bioclimatic design, I explore how a fragile, rounded, hollow fired system impacts its structural integrity and its ability to embed nature like qualities in modular form. Clay is brittle when thin, dry, or water absorbing material is added; it absorbs water slowly, needs to be a certain …

Entre Manos Y Barro: Innovando Con Tradición, Jose Mata

Masters Theses

"Entre Manos y Barro: Innovando con Tradicion'' (Between Hands and Clay: Traditional Innovation) dives into sustainable and ethical innovations of traditional Zapotec ceramics. It discusses how introducing thoughtfully designed tools, like a specialized caja humeda (wet box), can enhance artisans' workspaces while preserving the cultural essence of their craft. This initiative emphasizes innovations that honor traditional methods and focus on community involvement.

The thesis is grounded in the principles of ethical innovation, which emphasize respect for traditional techniques, community participation in the innovation process, and the sustainability of both the craft and the environment. These principles shape the development of …

Folding (And Unfolding): A Site-Responsive Strategy For Reusing Construction And Demolition Waste, Jennifer Ansley

Masters Theses

Discarding—in its most reductive formulation— is a sorting operation that makes distinctions between materials (as well as objects, people, communities, and landscapes) based on perceived value. In her book Waste of the World, Nicky Gregson, therefore, argues for a more careful collection-curation strategy that revalues and re-signifies “waste” to make it available for repair and reuse. Gregson, however, points to limited space and infrastructural capacity as a potential barrier to the development of new material handling strategies. My design responds by proposing a network of walls and paths that operate in each of the sites I’ve identified as an …

Strange Stranger: A Visceral Skin Glaze Exploration Into The Neurodivergent Sensory Experience, Sam J. Lucas

Ought: The Journal of Autistic Culture

Sam Lucas

Sam creates ambiguous figurative objects predominantly in clay. Her creative practice draws on her experience of being a neurodivergent woman today, by exploring aspects of her own unique neurotype.

The visceral glaze exploration pieces were the precursor to the final forms for her body of work called ‘Strange stranger’ where she is exploring the weight and awkwardness of being in the body, the pain this alienation can cause, and ironically the beauty and humour that results from this diversity.

The surfaces of the pieces were attempting to describe the interoceptive, exteroceptive and alexithymic confusion that can occur at …

Fragmented Bodies, Lauren Careese Alexander

Art Theses and Dissertations

Through Memory Webs and fragmented ceramic vessels, I express what it feels like to grow up living in a biracial body. I utilize mixed media to emulate a mixed-race experience. My Memory Webs are fashioned by painting on scraps of canvas and attaching them with crocheted wire and ribbon to speak to how my memory has impacted my identity. My fragmented ceramic vessels are cut up and stitched back together to represent disjointedness and un-belonging. All of my work is contextualized through the novel Frankenstein by Mary Shelley and what the Monster may represent for people of color. I also …

With Love, ; An Interdisciplinary And Intersectional Look At Why Creativity Is Essential, Theo Starr Gardner

Whittier Scholars Program

My Whittier Scholars Program self-designed major, Teaching Creativity, is a mixture of Art, Literature, and Education classes. My research and praxis classes have been focused on the ‘how?’s and 'why?’s of creativity, so it felt only right that my project should be a constructivist, generative project. The project I have been working on throughout my time at Whittier, and that has just fully come to fruition on April 11th, 2024, was a solo art gallery/open mic event entitled ‘With Love,’. With Love, was conceptually inspired by the research I’ve conducted on creativity and creative arts education over the past few …

Default, Noah Pica

Theses and Dissertations

“Default” explores the formation and maintenance of normalcy, uniformity, and banality in American life. Noah Pica starts with the visual language of lined paper, prefabricated objects, model-making kits, and blueprints. He reforms these structures through a sculpture practice, investigating how their design inconspicuously implements social norms.

Understanding Clay And Its Media Properties Through The Expressive Therapies Continuum, Anne Geisz

Art Therapy Counseling Final Research Projects

For centuries, clay has been used by civilizations to hold food, memories, and records of history. To this day, it is used by engineers, hobbyists, artists, art therapists and many more. This art based, heuristic study explores clay through the researcher’s ongoing practice with the material, within the framework of the Expressive Therapies Continuum (ETC) and examines how its unique media properties make it such a versatile material for both ceramic artists and art therapists. Results exhibit these unique media properties and clay’s ability to reach all levels of the ETC through collected data of images, journals, critiques, and notes. …

To Excavate An Absence, Margaret Compton

Graduate Theses

This thesis is an exploration of memory’s fluctuating aspects, utilizing natural materials and casting processes to create a sculptural body of work deeply rooted in materialized metaphor. Examining the relationship between mold and cast, part and whole, and interior and exterior, I utilize casting as a framework to understand the duality of remembering and forgetting. Memories, much like the natural landscape, are ephemeral, fading, and fracturing over time. Both external environments and internal mental landscapes share the common language of erosion, existing as present or absent, remembered or forgotten. Conestee Nature Preserve in Mauldin, South Carolina, serves as my “site” …

El Otro Cielo, Ana Buitrago

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

El Otro Cielo is an exhibition that mixes family items with personal creations, symbolizing the balance between evolving and staying connected to your roots. The work is about embracing change while remembering where you come from. This exhibition explores the stages to find one's true self while adapting to new cultures and changing over time. This installation delves into the complexities of cultural identity, memory, and the human experience. The space invites viewers to contemplate their own relationships with place, nostalgia, and the ongoing process of self-discovery.

Squaring The Circle, Carter Pasma

All Graduate Reports and Creative Projects, Fall 2023 to Present

“Squaring the circle” is often used as a metaphor for trying to do the impossible. In many ways, this relates directly to my life and the path I have chosen as a ceramic artist. Living in a world of mass production, people often overlook and under appreciate handmade objects. The pots I create are designed to make the person using them notice and appreciate the thoughtfulness of something handmade.

It is comforting to make objects that will ultimately be used to enhance someone’s daily routine. Reflecting on this as a ceramic artist is what drives me to create pots that …

Fragments Of Forgiveness, Sarah Hayashi

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

Trauma lives in the body, with or without conscious memory of the events that placed it there. To cope with the pain of trauma we might disconnect from our bodies, choosing to view ourselves as some separate entity living within the body. Disconnection offers a sense of protection by allowing compartmentalization of pain, grief, and trauma, but the harder these emotional fragments are fought, the more they demand acknowledgment.

Referencing my torso for size, I handbuild biomorphic sculptures from clay, finishing them with glaze that mimics the dewy texture of raw clay, using a palette derived from my skin tone …

Groundswell, Ursula Gullow

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The artist discusses the artwork of her Master of Fine Arts exhibition, Groundswell, held at Tipton Gallery in Johnson City, March 11 – 22, 2024. The exhibition includes wall pieces, sculpture, plaster, and ceramic objects that explore the traditional parameters of painting and its presentation.

Ideas discussed include the philosophy of history, and the origin of European art tropes such as odalisques, flowers, and birds. Framing devices, deconstructed paintings, fiber arts, ceramics, 18^th Century decorative art, plaster, the studio practice, Walter Benjamin, David Lowenthal, Gustave Courbet, Jean Honoré Fragonard, Titus Kaphar, Valerie Hegarty, and maximalism are also surveyed.

Origin Stories., Danielle Deeley

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis is an investigation into the Peruvian pre-Columbian collection at the Speed Art Museum in Louisville, Kentucky. The Speed Art Museum acquired this collection in 1934 and it has largely remained unresearched for nearly a century after acquisition into the museum’s collection. This investigation is not an attempt to make broad characterizations of pre-Columbian ceramics. Nor is its goal to fill in all the gaps of the collection’s history. Instead, this thesis follows the evidence the collection presents: the physical attributes of the ceramics, the donor’s history, U.S. history, and information from the collection file provided by the Speed …

Alabaster Glory., Chloe Cheng

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Alabaster Glory includes three installations in the gallery space: 望(wàng), 盛(chéng), and 余(yú). These components represent three stages of human life: the beginning, living on this earth, and the end. The core concept behind the three stages is the relationship between the creator (God) and creations, referring to humans that live in this broken world containing suffering, chaos, crime, conflict, or the personal experience of an inner void.

Alabaster Glory invites viewers to walk through the space first to encounter a magnitude of infant heart forms placed by a window, which intends to evoke curiosity about their quantity and symbolism. …

My Body Adorned, Marie Y. Peterson

Art and Art History Honors Projects

My studio art honors project is an autobiographical body of work expressed through a ceramic-based installation. Further exploring the hybridized identity of being an Asian-American adoptee, My Body Adorned aims to juxtapose the contentious history of body modifications using the familiar and prestigious visual language of South Korean-inspired celadon-ware. My Body Adorned showcases a collection of vessels inspired by Korean ceramics with “tattooed” exteriors. Reinforced and informed by my tattooing practice, my work exposes the visual, linguistic, and technical skills that intertwine clay and skin and establishes a conversation between my physical human body and body of work.

10-5, Avery Taylor

Forces

No abstract provided.

2024 Forces, Collin College

Forces

No abstract provided.

Q&A With Tori Ellis (Bfa Ceramics), Tori Ellis

Q & A Interviews with Art Students

No abstract provided.

Finding The Perfect Purple: An Exploration Of Glaze Making And Chemical Safety In The Pottery Studio, Kara Eppard, Michael Hough

ASPIRE 2024

This project was undertaken as an IDS-100H course linkage between ceramics and chemistry. Through time spent reviewing literature and time in the studio, a project was developed that allowed the application of technical skills of each discipline in a creative fashion. The creative focus of the project was to find a suitable purple glaze to utilize on a previously thrown pottery collection. During the project techniques in glaze making were explored. Over 25 glazes were tested, and two firing techniques were explored. Additionally, safety within the pottery studio was increased through aspects such as the development of an MSDS, and …

Permutations, Casey Beck

School of Art, Art History, and Design: Theses and Student Creative Work

I make pottery not only out of a passion for my material, clay, and for the complex processes of wheel throwing and atmospheric firing, but also out of a passion for living with, using, and sharing handmade objects. For me, using pottery daily is an act of celebration. My philosophy of making pots comes in part from the particular history of utilitarian pottery that has developed over the last sixty years in Minnesota and Western Wisconsin, where I went to school and began my career as a potter. More recently, the form language that I employ in my work has …

Or To Be Eaten Alive, Christopher Williams

School of Art, Art History, and Design: Theses and Student Creative Work

“or to be eaten alive'' is a multimedia exhibition in which I merge my own coming of age story with a mythological ecology. In this work I reclaim my queer identity by communing with my past selves in a fantasy world created through the lens of Queer Ecology and Queer Eco-Futurism. The visuals in this exhibition obscure reality. They are abstractions of the landscapes I occupy—particularly the Tallgrass prairie and Ozark ecoregions. Through a speculative, fantasy world the exhibition introduces moments of adoration, death, fracturing, growth, joy, and failure. I form, draw, color and arrange the work embracing mistakes and …

Creating An Index To Graduate Theses To Support Their Discoverability, Ellen Petraits

Transforming Libraries for Graduate Students

As a Research and Instruction Librarian, one of the most frequent questions I'm asked is how to find past theses on a particular topic or theme. There is an active thesis culture at RISD that goes beyond writing and binding a text. An exhibition is held in the graduate gallery to celebrate a curated selection of theses at the beginning of the academic year. (See Book of Thesis Books) Theses can range in format from an artist book to a loose-leaf portfolio. Many emphasize the visual and are a bridge to the student’s studio work. They may include unusual or …

Radical Youth Work: A Community Based Approach To Working With Youth, Young Adults And Families, Weston J. Robins

National Youth Advocacy & Resilience Conference

Radical Youth Work: A Community Based Approach to Working with Youth, Young Adults and Families

A focus on experiential mentoring, humanistic counseling and community engagement as a way to work with youth, young adults and families to provide true holistic therapeutic support and guidance.

Suffering Juicebox, Janelle O'Malley

Graduate Artistry Projects and Performances

Suffering Juicebox investigates the confluences of nostalgia, trauma and identity making by means of sculpture and performance. Creating pieces with built layers of material and found objects Suffering Juicebox takes shape through collecting, forming, layering, petrifying, erasing and reimagining. Pieces are assembled into scenes attempting to rebuild what cannot be obtained. The objects collected and used are metaphors for the memories we accumulate.

Suffering Juicebox explores how gender and identity are created through layers of memory, nostalgia and trauma. Nostalgia’s etymology comes from the greek words nostos meaning “return home” and algos meaning “pain”, and together the word means homesickness. …