The Lexington Arts and Crafts Society, 130 Waltham Street, Lexington, MA 02421 - (781) 862-9696
April 1 - 29, 2007
Welcome
Lexington Arts & Crafts Society
Juror's Statement
Chris Gustin
Business Sponsors
Individual and Family Sponsors
Acknowledgments
Exhibit
Welcome
The Ceramics Guild of the Lexington Arts & Crafts Society welcomes you to the 5th biennial “The State of Clay”. It is always a pleasure to put this show together and to gather old and new friends to the Parsons Gallery.
This year’s “The State of Clay” had a record number of applicants. Juror Chris Gustin chose 82 from 288 submitted entries. The pieces highlight a diverse range of work from contemporary ceramicists. Some are functional potters, dedicated to the beauty of everyday objects. Some are sculptors who explore the inner landscape of symbolic imagery, metaphor, whimsy or narrative. Applicants come from the four corners of the state and across the country, but all have ties to Massachusetts.
The artists on exhibit are unified by the frustrating and joyous challenge of working with a malleable, tactile medium - a medium which invokes the artist to touch, to create, to get one’s hands “in the mud”.
It is the Guild’s hope that you will find inspiration in this impressive body of artwork. We invite you to view each object, talk to the artists and gallery sitters, and learn, as we are still learning, about the expressive qualities of clay. Enjoy the show.
Lexington Arts & Crafts Society
Located in Lexington, MA, the Lexington Arts & Crafts Society was founded in 1935 and currently has a membership of 400 members from the New England region. There are nine different guilds. The Ceramics Guild, with a membership of 35, maintains a fully equipped studio, and sponsors workshops, classes and exhibitions throughout the year. General and membership information is available on the website lexingtonma.org/LACS/ or call 781-862-9696.
Juror’s Statement
“The State of Clay” celebrates the field of ceramics, showcasing the full spectrum of clay, whether functional or sculptural, highlighting work that is representative of the immense possibility within this medium. As with many exhibitions these days, the jurying process is one that is both exciting and cautious, for selections were made by reviewing digital images, rather than the actual work. This is an important distinction, for as a juror who is himself an object maker, the task of discerning the nuance of a particular work thru image is an act of trust, absorbing the information as presented and pulling on one’s own experience to imagine scale, weight, material, craftsmanship and idea.
With the application process requesting digital images rather than slides, it was a delightful process having days, rather than hours, to sit alone and look at images on the computer, taking time to consider the work that was so carefully presented. I looked at pots, tableware, installation work, wall pieces, figurative sculpture, raw form and tile, all representing the numerous voices that are strong within the field of contemporary clay.
As images were digested, themes began to develop, with the work separating itself out into groupings of ideas. I began to choose work that for me spoke of a deep understanding of material, process and idea. Not all of the images were of a high quality though, which may have affected the selection process. I’m sure there were pieces that I passed over, their image not doing justice to the actual object. Some were of low resolution, so there was no opportunity to enlarge an image to see detail and thus explore the piece in a way that one might if the object was held in their hands. Others only presented a single view, thus limiting the amount of visual information that is so necessary in understanding the whole. Yet there was a tremendous amount of creative energy in the work presented, even in the quietest of pieces, and what emerged from this selection process was some eighty or so pieces that for me represent a breadth of forms and ideas that do indeed speak to the versatility and creative expression found in Massachusetts, our state of clay.
Chris Gustin
Chris is a studio artist and Emeritus Professor of Ceramics at the University of Massachusetts at Dartmouth. He received his BFA from the Kansas City Art Institute in 1975, and his MFA from Alfred University in 1977. Since retiring from a 20 year teaching career in 1999, he has devoted himself to studio work and Gustin Ceramics Tile Production, a company he established in 1996. Chris has published extensively, and is represented in numerous public and private collections, including the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, The Daum Museum, the Syracuse Museum, the Shigaraki Cultural Park in Japan, The Yingge Museum in Taipei, and the Victoria and Albert Museum, London.
With over thirty solo exhibitions, he has exhibited, lectured and taught workshops in the United States, Caribbean, Europe and Asia. He has received two National Endowment for the Arts Artist Fellowships, and two Massachusetts Crafts Fellowships, the most recent in 2005.
Business Sponsors
The Ceramics Guild of the Lexington Arts & Crafts Society thanks all the sponsors for their financial support for “The State of Clay” exhibition.
Aftosa
1776 Wright Ave.
Richmond, CA 94804
American Art Clay Co, Inc.
6060 Guion Road
Indianapolis, IN 46254
Bailey Pottery Equipment Corporation
PO Box 1577
Kingston, NY 12402
Clay Times Magazine
PO Box 365
15481 Second Street
Waterford, VA 20197
Chem-Clay Corp, Standard Ceramic
Division
PO Box 4435
Pittsburgh, PA 15205
Handworks Gallery of American Crafts
161 Great Road
Acton, MA 01720
Laguna Clay
14400 Lomitas Ave.
City of Industry, CA 91746
Michelson’s Shoes, Inc.
1780 Massachusetts Ave.
Lexington, MA 02421
Orton Ceramic Foundation
6991 Old 3C Highway
Westerville, OH 43082
Portland Pottery South
87 Messina Drive
Braintree, MA 02184
Sheffield Pottery, Inc.
P.O. Box 399
Sheffield, MA 01257
The Potters Shop
31 Thorpe Road
Needham, MA 02494
The Lexington “Trustee of Public Trusts”
The George L. Gilmore Fund
Town Hall
1625 Massachusetts Avenue
Lexington, MA 02420
Individual and Family Sponsors
Alice and Walter Abrams
Barbara and Chris Bartlett
Joan and Peter Carcia
Teresa Deible
Tina Forbes
Carla and Tom Fortmann
JaeOK and Kang Lee
Molly Nye
Mary Francis Owens
Crystal and Bill Ribich
Gail Roberts
Cynthia Samuelson and
Jonathan Samen
Phyllis Sonnenschein
Alan and Lynne Wilson
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The Ceramics Guild of the Lexington Arts & Crafts Society is a group of extraordinary people who joined together in bringing this special exhibition to the people of Massachusetts. Without their diligence, hard work, long hours, and their love of this challenging medium, this show would not have happened. The co-chairs wish to thank all the members and prospective members of the Ceramics Guild:
Rhona Barlevy (P)
Margaret Barrington
Tommie Bond
Joan Carcia
Linda Christen
Lauren Davis
Teresa Deible
Sharon Espar
Lynne Fisher
Helen Fitts
Peter Flister
Tina Forbes
Ronnie Gould
Suzanne Grey
Holly Herring
Monique Heyman (P)
Susan Keroes
Alison Lauriat
Bet Lee
Bick Mee Lee
Don Lyons
Roz Lyons
Pauline Marino
Linda McAulay
Susan McCleery
Molly Nye
Yanira Palfreman
Cora Pucci
Sayaka Rawizza
Cindy Samuelson
Jean Terrio
Marcia Thompson
Kathy FlynnWoodland
Pao Fei Yang
Thank you to the 104 artists who entered 288 digital prints of their work. We appreciate your willingness to go through the application and jury process. Without you there would be no “The State of Clay”. Keep up the good work.
A very special thanks to Shawn Panepinto, Coordinator of the Ceramics Program at the Office for the Arts at Harvard. We are indebted to her patience, humor, and her generosity of time as she navigated the co-chairs through the maze of the digital system.
Thank you to Dan Vardaro, Elizabeth Johnson and the Graphic Communications Technology students at Minuteman Regional High School for their graphic and printing skills in putting this catalogue together.
Thank you to Susan McCabe for volunteering her graphic design skills.
Finally, a thank you to the Lexington Arts & Crafts Society for its 71 years of arts and crafts leadership in Lexington and the surrounding communities. A special thanks to Sandy Blanchet and volunteer Jean Hart for their invaluable help throughout the year. As always, a special thanks to Mel Webb who keeps us clean and well lighted!
