Featured Image Deo (1920 x 600 px) (2)
Mallory Rusk graduated from Northern Michigan University in May 2021 with a degree in Computer Art. During her studies, she also found herself with a growing passion for ceramics. To continue this pursuit, Mallory joined the Post Baccalaureate program for Ceramics at Northern. Her goal is to create compelling sculptural work which deals with the human condition.
Our individual lives appear to be so unique, but many people have asked the same questions, felt the same feelings, and dealt with the same struggles within their environments. Realizing we are not alone with the progression of life can help people to be kinder to themselves, and be more accepting of mistakes which help us learn. Using a mix of both wheel-thrown and hand-built pieces she explores these concepts through abstract structures that have universal elements.
Polarity
“. . . All can see beauty as beauty, only because there is ugliness. All can know good as good only because there is evil. Being and nonbeing produce each other.”
This excerpt from the Tao Te Ching inspired the Polarity series. Finding the balance between polarities that create each other was the goal in creating the series. One cannot exist without the other. Each detail within the composition highlights its opposite. The dark, raw clay body makes the white shop slip stand out, the glossy glazes bring emphasis to the cracking glazes, and vice versa for both. In creating these compositions there was quite a lot of failure but without it there could not be success. Experimentation is required to be able to create a visual language and not everything tested turns out as theorized. With both success and failure knowledge is gained.
Throughout my lifetime thus far, there has been tension between the push and pull of what others would like to see of me, and the identity I have paved for myself. While the external pressures around us have the ability to help support our growth and development, in some ways those same pressures can morph an identity that becomes inauthentic with our true selves. It is our job as individuals to continue our personal growth, organically, regardless of the everyday pressures and life events that may cause us to stray off of our desired path.
Gestural, abstract forms and design elements that are pulled from the human body and the underwater world act as building blocks for biomorphic vessels to come to life. Exploration of one’s sexuality and individual discoveries of one’s self begins to mimic the investigations of the otherworldly nature of life below sea level. The conjunction of these two entities allows for further examination of the many parallels that are apparent between these natural life forces. Alluring visual structures uncover the faint memories of what it was like growing up as a young female living in a world full of precedent social structures. Conjoining these experiences with the sublime attraction of the world below sea level lures viewers to look a little closer at my work. The intimate experience between the vessels and viewer act as a catalyst for discovering comfortability and growth within the things that inherently make us uncomfortable.
I am a ceramic artist located in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. In 2021, I received a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Art and Design with a Ceramics concentration from Northern Michigan University. Some of the best memories from my formative years are doing arts and crafts with my mom and painting pottery with my aunt. Thinking about those times, I feel like I have always been an artist. Sitting down to work on a sculpture, painting, or piece of art makes me feel closer to who I am meant to be. The act of making something from nothing and being able to make people think a little deeper, or even just smile, without having to use any words is my favorite part of being an artist. As someone who comes from an acrylic painting background, I wanted to find a way to create new work that would not be limited by one specific medium. Ceramics was the perfect way to meld multiple mediums. I find it so exciting that there is so much left to learn about ceramics, and I hope to keep learning new methods, techniques, and skills for the rest of my life.
Throughout all records of life on Earth, no living organism has killed more humans or altered the course of history more than the mosquito. This series of sculptures uses humor to inform the viewer of the longevity, resilience, and power of the mosquito as the world’s deadliest predator.
As an artist, I present information in a way that entices people to learn more and to question things around them that they normally wouldn’t think twice about. Using mixed media, mainly stoneware clay and acrylic paint, I create animated and playful scenes that take up physical space in the world and leave the viewer wondering, “Why”?
From aiding in the extinction of the dinosaurs, to commandeering transoceanic voyages, and effortlessly targeting communities of prey regardless of species, the tiny mosquito has consistently ravaged the world with plagues infecting nearly 230 million people per year. The mosquito arrived on this planet long before humans ever did. She has survived every attempt we have made at eradicating her malarious reign thus far. At this rate, will she be able to outlive us too?
My name’s Drake Perez. I’m currently an Art Major at Northern Michigan university with an emphasis in both video and ceramic art., I’m always striving to push both mediums in unique ways. Growing up in a remote area, cinema was one of my most prominent ways to connect with the world – both at home and in the big picture. One of the big reasons my family and I would go to town together aside from groceries, work, or school; was going to the theater. This love grew into a desire to create films and videos to spread the joy and messages I once saw and enjoyed growing up.
Ceramic art came into my life through a friend pushing me to take a wheel throwing class, and I’ve been in love with the medium ever since. The physical touch between the artist and the clay is something that doesn’t come in modern day filmmaking. This difference between tangible and intangible has helped create a balance within myself as I navigate through the physical world and the ever-growing presence the digital world is creating.
Ultimately, I’ve come to love working with these two completely different mediums and I’m excited to see what the future holds with both of them.
Viewing Time
Being a video artist for four years, cinema has always been a more dominating presence in my practice. However, over the past two years ceramic art has crept into my life and taken hold me in a way that cinema and video art are unable to do. Tangible work, work I can touch and physically lives in a space, something modern film doesn’t do, is exactly why this hold has taken place. Over the past two years of splitting my time between both mediums, I decided to come up with a goal to create works that combine both mediums in a way that speaks to myself and to others around me. One of these works is this series of planters and pots.
VHS/VCR tapes first entered the United States in a domestic capacity around 1976, and was phased out by DVDs around 20 years later. After another ten years, Blu-ray discs entered circulation in a larger consumer manor, and in even less time than that digital streaming has become consumer norm. The advancement in visual media technology increased with each new step, leaving behind objects that are no longer produced at a consumer level scale. Each planter plays on this concept of past “relics” and how one day they’ll be reclaimed by nature. This concept allows for each piece to be unique while keeping the feeling of being a part of a set. Ultimately, the series is an exploration of how planters and pots could be more than just the traditional vessel. Think about the pictures you may have seen of trees growing through old cars, vines through windows, etcetera. There are so many objects hiding out in the wilderness that nature will one day reclaim for itself, as long as mankind leaves nature untouched.
For this series, I researched and explored techniques of creating dramatic layered texture surfaces on pots thrown on the wheel, taking inspiration from a mix of Mid Century and Japanese art, and intricate natural surfaces such as weathered rock faces and unique tree bark. By using different techniques of altering the surface, such as layering slips, the use of sodium silicate, slicing, carving, and stretching, each pot is unique in shape and surface. I push the form to its limits, while enhancing the surfaces with shino glazes, each embodying textures and colors of their own. This research led me to develop the beginnings of my own style and continue to grow as a potter.
I began my education at Finlandia University International School of Art and Design as an Integrated Design major, because of a love of nature and appreciation for sustainable design techniques. However, my creative inclination wasn’t satisfied, I craved a more intimate relationship with my creations; ceramics was the answer to this desire for a more physical connection. After a year of ceramics education, I transferred to Northern Michigan University to continue a Ceramics education. I’m fascinated by intimate objects as well as connection. It’s important to connect with others as well, to share experiences and offer a point of relation; so that people don’t feel isolated in their situations. Through themed collections I’m extending a hand to everyone by sharing intimate details; of struggles and successes, distress and self grounding. Two-dimensional line work on vessels of commodity allow for viewers to begin with a simple relation; which deepens as they explore the fine details, color and shape meanings.
Worry Stones
Worry stones have been a comforting presence since my childhood, the textures and dimples offered a tactile distraction from the intense emotions within. Creating them out of clay now is a meditative process fueled by the desire to create and help others deal with intense emotions.
What We Can Handle
As a transgender individual who grew up deeply depressed and anxious, I matured early because of the collective intensity of everything that was happening within, to and around me. At 13 and 14 I was hospitalized at a children’s mental facility where I was “safe” from myself and the pressures of home and school, but it added more difficulties to the situation. These are the main influences within this collection, fueled by the intent of telling a story and offering a point of connection with others.
Distance
Tightly packed linear designs with spiny extrusions are a metaphor for trauma, how triggers conjure a sort of “sharp” feeling memory from the back of the mind. The detailed surface draws the eye and mind, while the intrusive spines remind the viewer of the discomfort related to trauma triggers.
Flow
Linework flows through negative white space and structural dimples, the thin ends dance with each other around the piece. A metaphor for the ebbs and flows of life, while heartbreaking at times, it can be equally as beautiful.
Embodiment
A marker of the beginning of my positive connection with the bodily vessel I was given. An important milestone was trusting in what I felt, having previously been in denial of a personal need for Hormone Replacement Therapy (HRT). Embodiment represents the act of self love, the leap to find myself that was beginning Testosterone and accepting myself. Thighs hold an importance to the weekly ritual of HRT as they are where my shot is injected.
Michigan-based ceramic artist, Caitlin Snyder, has been pursuing her BFA in Art and Design with a concentration in ceramics for the past several years, honing her storytelling in works fueled by social issues. An ex-English major and bibliphile, she employs fantasy and reverie in her art as a platform to discuss themes like feminism, societal issues, and social injustice. Snyder uses her knowledge and experience in concept art to create precise digital designs that the mythical ideas into a ceramic reality. Snyder believes that the physicality of ceramics offers the unique potential of reigning in the farthest reaches of her imagination; She gravitates towards clay because the medium allows her to work the narrative out with her hands, creating work that makes social issues legible to others, feeding her mind, body, and soul in the process.
This wall-hung collection of wide, shallow bowls celebrates the era of acceptance that society is fighting to enter, highlighting the huge paradigm shift in societal expectations regarding body image and beauty standards. Designs are centered around modern icons who are changing the status quo; a mix of symmetrical repeating patterns, photos of today’s game-changing celebrities, and images taken from 1950’s advertisements and comic books create a collage-style composition that celebrates what can only be described as an evolution in acceptance. I’ve chosen celebrities who deal with specific sects in the new world order of beauty standards – Lizzo represents body size acceptance, Harry Styles for androgyny and gender-fluid fashion, Rhianna represents sex positivity and size inclusivity (as the owner of the world’s first major size-inclusive lingerie brand and fashion show), Lil Nas x for openly celebrating lgbtq+ representation, and Billie Eilish for androgynous fashion and against sexualization of underage women in the media. This body of works’ focus was very much on surface design, layering pattern, and imagery to create contrast between old beauty standards and current body positivity and acceptance.
These forms were created in the same scale as the notorious kitschy, collectible plates we all know and love, with my own variation of concave edges. The concept of a physical embodiment of acceptance and celebration of diversity being displayed proudly on someone’s wall or mantle is very heartwarming to me. In times of great social change throughout history, people will always butt heads and disagree, and we find ourselves in one of the greatest examples of that currently, whether that be in terms of marriage laws, women’s reproductive rights, fighting racism, or any example of the abundance of diversity and inclusion issues we are seeing unfold. Upholding what we view as right is becoming increasingly important, but it’s so much easier to do so and educate others on tough issues when we make it fun and applicable to things they see in their own lives, like celebrities and collectible plates. Beauty standards and the way we view ourselves isn’t just an issue for women or queer people or people of color or nonbinary/transgender people, this is something everyone goes through and compares themselves to, so it’s very important to me that this is an installation that everyone can view and, hopefully, enjoy.
