Squiggly Plate (no title yet...)
Tie
Unequal
(Intended display of Unequal - plates side by side)
To Have or Have Not (Installation)
Exploring different arrangements....
Hello everyone! A lot of these images are works in progress. Nonetheless, it would be helpful to have your feedback.
I use the plate forms to "frame" their contents and tell a story. "Plate 1" (untitled) will have gold luster painted inside the ball that has been cut to reveal the interior. "Squiggly Plate" is particularly interesting to me as I am moving the forms off the plate. I imagine the creation of a whole army of forms wanting to get onto a plate (which excites me because I love making multiples)!
"Unequal" carries out my original intent in throwing plates that look alike. By setting two similar plates next to each other, I wanted the viewer to be aware of the difference in serving size (or to be able to look at a freshly presented plate in comparison with one that shows traces of a meal).
"To Have or Have Not": These photos show different arrangements of an installation piece. I am still trying to figure out the spacing. I have a thought about putting the bowl full of knot-like forms near the edge of the table and stringing together the pieces so that they look like they are spilling over the edge. What arrangements do you care for the most/least?
I am using food as a metaphor for the feelings of fullness or emptiness that one can experience in his/her relationships with other people.
5 comments:
Hi Juliane!
I was excited to see that your post was up and that you have been making new and exciting work!
Of the work, I am most interested by squiggle plate and tie. These do not seem to be glazed yet, but I really like the stark surface - how are you thinking of finishing them? I like it that they are a simplification of some of your early ideas - maybe simplification is a bad word, more of a distillation. They are less of a food reference than a lot of your work, and they conjure up some of the other things that make their way onto the dinner plate -- those wormy, leech-like thoughts and emotions trying to squirm their way onto a dining experience. Like you, I am interested by the off-the-plate concept and think that you could go a long way with this. Your other pieces convey some of your intent by using the 'a lot versus a little' method. With tie and squiggle plate, you are able to do this using other devices. To me it is both more subtle and more powerful.
Unequal -- I am really intrigued by the little pearly bits - they seem to be submerged in the plate in some cases? Again, your color palette is subdued but the surface is super rich. As I alluded to earlier, I'm not as interested by the 'a lot versus a little' approach. This goes for To have or have not as well. It makes me uncomfortable that one bowl has so much and the rest are entirely empty. Maybe this reaction is a good thing -- like I have this "it's just not fair" feeling about it. However, having a bunch of empty bowls on a table isn't that visually interesting. What if the bowls were all clustered on one side of the table, with the overflowing one on the other? Of the arrangements, the bottom one is the most interesting to me.
I'll keep thinking about this work and let you know if I have any breakthroughs. Hope everything is going well,
Megan
hey juliane!
you've been busy... how exciting!
i agree with megan regarding the squiggle plate. it does seem like a distillation of your ideas and the metaphor is more effective for me.
i think that's what i'd like to talk about the most- metaphor. you mentioned that you want to talk about emptiness and fullness within relationships. as megan mentioned, the wiggly forms are more reminiscent of emotions and thoughts. they are also more full of movement, and seem like they are sneaking away with intention. then when they are tied, they are clearly dedicated to that position. they are biological and flexible and ambiguous enough to reference a number of things without actually being anything specific. i think that makes them quite effective. i think about how some relationships just work and are settled in their passion and how others just run screaming regardless of how we try to hold them together.
in contrast, the food items are less effective if we are talking about relationships. this is interesting because for so many of us food and emotion and self confidence are intertwined. i think the food pieces are definitely bringing up issues of consumption for me. because there are noodles and what look like asian foods (to me- perhaps its the color as well as the form) i think immediately about how all our food comes from china these days. i think about global issues and who has what and starvation and gluttony. so if that's what you're going for, its working, but if not, i wonder how you can bring a bit more intimacy into the piece. are there some foods that are more intimate than others? what a weird question. or perhaps the vessels need to be communicating in a different way. i'm not sure. just something to think about.
as far as arrangements on the table go, i like the last one best. but i wonder what would happen if the food parts were strung off the side and moving across the floor.... what if there was another bowl down there for them to move towards? a tiny one? a huge one?
i hope this helps somewhat.
lovemel.
Hi there, Juliane, It,s candice! I hope all is well.... Im pretty bogged down with school right now and don't have my full mental capacity but I wanted to write and say that I really enjoyed the conceptual part of the work. We get so caught up in the physical end product in ceramics that sometimes we lose sight of a deeper meaning and if work does hold a deeper meaning than it usually is very personal. It is nice to see the simplicity and the statement combined. I will have a chance for a closer look in a week when all my finals are done. candice
Hi Juliane,
Martina here...my apologies for the late response. i am finding it challenging to respond coherently to the work. I fell as though what i am about to say may be a contradiction to my last response. Did i say then to get closer to food if that's what you want to talk about? if so, now i'm not so sure. Your past work was more open to interpretation - allowing the viewer to imagine more of your intended meaning - to lose themselves in the repetition of the multiples.
in 'Unequal' it seems the reference to the have/have not dichotomy is perhaps a little obvious. looking through your comments - i was intrigued by the idea of traces of food but your current arrangement seems static. the plates seem to talk more about more vs. less rather than what may have been there before.
the parts of 'tie' are less static and the movement of the parts allow for a greater freedom of interpretation. movement is also for me the most interesting element of 'to have or have not'. the asymmetry of the bottom arrangement flows well across the table and i too am curious to see how it would seem if the components in the bowl were to move off onto the floor.
while i realize these pieces aren't finished - have you intentionally avoided color?
Am i right in relating these pieces to your last post - although here the work is more grounded on the plates - but similar concepts?
i realize these comments are disjointed - and i know i'm late in responding, but feel like i need more information to respond more constructively. if you get a chance, email me and maybe we can keep conversation going a bit. i am interested to learn more about where you're going with this.
martina
Juliane – I like seeing some of your work in progress - it’s interesting to envision how the elements will change with the addition of luster and color. I would love to see a little before-and-after photo!
I really like the squiggly plate (have you decided on a title yet?). With the way you’ve set up your “squiggles” it looks like the ones off the edge of the plate are watching the action taking place between the two on the plate. The plate becomes a kind of stage or ring – I keep thinking of a boxing match. And seeing the squiggle plate displayed next to “Tie” makes the connection even stronger for me. I can’t wait to see where you go with the multiples…
Unequal makes me think of a few things. One, and Mel touched on this as well, has to do with current food issues across the globe. I immediately head toward the American’s plate piled high next to the meager portion from the developing nation. The other direction I head with this is male vs. female - a woman picking at a tiny plate of food while a man inhales a pile of pasta.
I’m going to agree that “To Have or Have Not” is less effective for me visually. I like the idea floating around of having the empty bowls clustered to one side and the full bowl at the other. Maybe you could have a trail of the “food” heading away from the empty bowls and toward the full bowl. What about suspending the empty bowls somehow above the table and having the full bowl being the only one sitting on the table?
Congrats on your new position at Hope College!!
--Kip
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