Zemer Peled’s labor-intensive process that bridges narrative and formalist elements. Peled utilizes a process of creation and destruction to make sculptures consisting of thousands of handcrafted porcelain shards resulting in works that can be read in relation to art historical tradition, outsider art, and natural phenomena.

The sculpture’s narrative impulses lean to encounters with the otherworldly—like complex topiaries marking a not-so-distant land--yet they remain distinctly tied to earth’s patterns. This conflation of the foreign and familiar creates a frenzied dislocation in the work. Inspired by migratory habits of birds, a sweep of feathers, and cycles of change, the works spiral outwardly in rhythmic patterns, interpreting not only the dynamism of nature, but also the startling strangeness of a life lived in transition.

Using white and colored porcelains, Peled transforms sharp slivers of porcelain into feathers, petals, leaves, and spines that describe objects of unknowable origins: seductive but untrustworthy. The forms are complexly ordered from the inside out, often bulging or spilling over with textures both delicate and severe. In some works, large scale-like ceramic pieces appear airy, delicate, and fluffy, as if one's breath might break it. In others, Peled's fragments are geometric barbs that mysteriously take on an alluring form - offering a sense of softness despite a sharp actuality. The forms are never static; the visual dance of sharp ceramic parts conveys a sense of constant movement. Like a murmuration of starlings, the sculptures appear to shift shapes as you move around them, an identity becoming and unbecoming in front of you.

The act of making for Peled is a feat of endurance, improvisation, and adaptation with the aim to embody a fleeting but fundamental feeling of mystery. The construction of her sculpture parallels negotiations any outsider makes in encountering a new world as they delicately construct a self that is both adaptable and resilient.

Peled's work examines the beauty and brutality of the natural world. Her sculptural language is formed by her surrounding landscapes and nature, and engages with themes of memories, identity, and place. Her sculptures and installations consist of thousands of hand-crafted porcelain shards; a technique that yields a texture both delicate and severe. In some works, large scale-like ceramic pieces appear airy, delicate, and fluffy, as if one's breath might break it. In others, Peled's fragments are geometric barbs that mysteriously take on an alluring form - offering a sense of softness despite a sharp actuality.

Zemer Peled (b. 1983) was born and raised in a Kibbutz in the northern part of Israel. After completing her BFA from the Bezalel Academy of Art and Design (Jerusalem), she earned her MA at the Royal College of Art (UK). In recent years, her work has been exhibited internationally, including such venues as Sotheby's and Saatchi Gallery (London), Eretz Israel Museum (Tel Aviv), the Henry Moore Gallery at the Royal College of Art (London), and the Orangerie du Senate (Paris), among others. The artist currently lives and works at the Archie Bray Foundation Residency (Helena, MT). Additional information on this incredible artist can be found on our website at: www.markmoorefineart.com

Zemer Peled's work examines the beauty and brutality of the natural world. Her sculptural language is formed by her surrounding landscapes and nature, and engages with themes of memories, identity, and place. Her sculptures and installations consist of thousands of hand-crafted porcelain shards; a technique that yields a texture both delicate and severe. In some works, large scale-like ceramic pieces appear airy, delicate, and fluffy, as if one's breath might break it. In others, Peled's fragments are geometric barbs that mysteriously take on an alluring form - offering a sense of softness despite a sharp actuality.

ARTIST STATEMENT:

Photography is as much the subject of my work as it is the medium in which I work. I employ traditional photographic techniques and methods of appropriation, extraction, multiple production, and intervention, to explore how we, as a culture, make and use images.

My focus on collective practices in photography has led me to examine subjects that are collectively photographed. I take the sheer quantity of images online as a collective archive that represents us - a constantly changing auto-portrait. I view all visual expression within this collectively emergent environment as potential for social signs that hint at something other than what they depict. The work is an accumulation that navigates between consumer and producer, materiality and immateriality, and individual and collective expression.

The idea of absence and erasure is a constant theme in my work, especially with regard to the popular uses of technologies in photography and on the Internet that seem to promise visibility, community and intimacy. I question the idea of the democratization of media, where pre-scripted images, made with tools programmed to function in predetermined ways, claim to foster subjectivity and individuality.

In much of my work I address how differently an image functions on the internet than in physical time/space, the shifts in meaning around the subject depicted in the image in both contexts, and what happens to the image's perceived value when transcribed from web-based to print-based media.

I have begun to see some of the objects pictured in the images I find as the aftermath and by-products of Modernism. These images register the disparity between an optimistic Modernism (the seduction of clean emptied space; promises of efficiency and productivity; the mass-production and availability of everything) and the dystopic result (technological breakdown, ecological disaster, social alienation).

On Site: United States Census Bureau headquarters in Suitland, Maryland

Originally commissioned for the new US Census Bureau headquarters, the American Varietal project includes a 40-foot "data-mural", a real-time multi-touch interface system (coming soon), a suite of four large print works, and literally thousands of images and animations. At the core of the project is a 3-dimensional dataform representing all 3171 US counties and their populations from 1790 to 2010. This form, a collection of curved sheets or skeins, visualizes the growth of the US population, in its entirety, over the course of 220 years.

Each skein maps directly to an individual county, its color derived from the flag of the state it resides in, while the shape of each corresponds to its growth curve. In a very real sense then, this artwork is merely a graph of these statistics. But the transformation of numbers into visuals is a tricky thing and calls an interesting question into focus. That is, what is the proper balance between truth-in-data for information purposes on the one hand, and the presentation and appreciation of pure form on the other? Considering the client is one of the premier information gathering entities in the world, it felt presumptuous and unnecessary (and rather boring) to make an object intended to "teach" them something. My solution, instead, is a clinically plotted 3-dimensional "graph" whose prime purpose is a counterintuitive aestheticizing of information rather than an overtly informative aim.

ARTIST STATEMENT:

Photography is as much the subject of my work as it is the medium in which I work. I employ traditional photographic techniques and methods of appropriation, extraction, multiple production, and intervention, to explore how we, as a culture, make and use images.

My focus on collective practices in photography has led me to examine subjects that are collectively photographed. I take the sheer quantity of images online as a collective archive that represents us - a constantly changing auto-portrait. I view all visual expression within this collectively emergent environment as potential for social signs that hint at something other than what they depict. The work is an accumulation that navigates between consumer and producer, materiality and immateriality, and individual and collective expression.

The idea of absence and erasure is a constant theme in my work, especially with regard to the popular uses of technologies in photography and on the Internet that seem to promise visibility, community and intimacy. I question the idea of the democratization of media, where pre-scripted images, made with tools programmed to function in predetermined ways, claim to foster subjectivity and individuality.

In much of my work I address how differently an image functions on the internet than in physical time/space, the shifts in meaning around the subject depicted in the image in both contexts, and what happens to the image's perceived value when transcribed from web-based to print-based media.

I have begun to see some of the objects pictured in the images I find as the aftermath and by-products of Modernism. These images register the disparity between an optimistic Modernism (the seduction of clean emptied space; promises of efficiency and productivity; the mass-production and availability of everything) and the dystopic result (technological breakdown, ecological disaster, social alienation).

Yoram Wolberger uses childhood toys and everyday domestic items to create his large scale sculptures, foregrounding the latent symbolism and cultural paradigms of these objects that so subtly inform Western culture. By enlarging this ephemera to life size, Wolberger emphasizes the distortions of their original manufacture disallowing any real illusion and conceptually forcing the viewer to reconsider their meanings. When enlarged beyond any possibility of dismissal, we see that toy soldiers create lines between Us and Them, plastic cowboys and Indians marginalize and stereotype the Other, even wedding cake bride and groom figurines dictate our expected gender roles.

Yoram Wolberger uses childhood toys and everyday domestic items to create his large scale sculptures, foregrounding the latent symbolism and cultural paradigms of these objects that so subtly inform Western culture. By enlarging this ephemera to life size, Wolberger emphasizes the distortions of their original manufacture disallowing any real illusion and conceptually forcing the viewer to reconsider their meanings. When enlarged beyond any possibility of dismissal, we see that toy soldiers create lines between Us and Them, plastic cowboys and Indians marginalize and stereotype the Other, even wedding cake bride and groom figurines dictate our expected gender roles.

Yoram Wolberger uses childhood toys and everyday domestic items to create his large scale sculptures, foregrounding the latent symbolism and cultural paradigms of these objects that so subtly inform Western culture. By enlarging this ephemera to life size, Wolberger emphasizes the distortions of their original manufacture disallowing any real illusion and conceptually forcing the viewer to reconsider their meanings. When enlarged beyond any possibility of dismissal, we see that toy soldiers create lines between Us and Them, plastic cowboys and Indians marginalize and stereotype the Other, even wedding cake bride and groom figurines dictate our expected gender roles.

Yoram Wolberger uses childhood toys and everyday domestic items to create his large scale sculptures, foregrounding the latent symbolism and cultural paradigms of these objects that so subtly inform Western culture. By enlarging this ephemera to life size, Wolberger emphasizes the distortions of their original manufacture disallowing any real illusion and conceptually forcing the viewer to reconsider their meanings. When enlarged beyond any possibility of dismissal, we see that toy soldiers create lines between Us and Them, plastic cowboys and Indians marginalize and stereotype the Other, even wedding cake bride and groom figurines dictate our expected gender roles.

Yoram Wolberger uses childhood toys and everyday domestic items to create his large scale sculptures, foregrounding the latent symbolism and cultural paradigms of these objects that so subtly inform Western culture. By enlarging this ephemera to life size, Wolberger emphasizes the distortions of their original manufacture disallowing any real illusion and conceptually forcing the viewer to reconsider their meanings. When enlarged beyond any possibility of dismissal, we see that toy soldiers create lines between Us and Them, plastic cowboys and Indians marginalize and stereotype the Other, even wedding cake bride and groom figurines dictate our expected gender roles.

Yoram Wolberger uses childhood toys and everyday domestic items to create his large scale sculptures, foregrounding the latent symbolism and cultural paradigms of these objects that so subtly inform Western culture. By enlarging this ephemera to life size, Wolberger emphasizes the distortions of their original manufacture disallowing any real illusion and conceptually forcing the viewer to reconsider their meanings. When enlarged beyond any possibility of dismissal, we see that toy soldiers create lines between Us and Them, plastic cowboys and Indians marginalize and stereotype the Other, even wedding cake bride and groom figurines dictate our expected gender roles.

Yoram Wolberger uses childhood toys and everyday domestic items to create his large scale sculptures, foregrounding the latent symbolism and cultural paradigms of these objects that so subtly inform Western culture. By enlarging this ephemera to life size, Wolberger emphasizes the distortions of their original manufacture disallowing any real illusion and conceptually forcing the viewer to reconsider their meanings. When enlarged beyond any possibility of dismissal, we see that toy soldiers create lines between Us and Them, plastic cowboys and Indians marginalize and stereotype the Other, even wedding cake bride and groom figurines dictate our expected gender roles.

LaceMath
Jeanne Quinn
Artist Statement

Line, in the form of thread moving through space and interlocking with itself, becomes a plane: lace. Lace plays with space; it is continuous linear movement, and it is a flat object.

My installation is a drawing of a piece of lace from seventeenth-century Italy. I drew the lace pattern using Rhino 3-d, a CAD program used to design objects for digital fabrication. Flattening the dimensional representation into a wireframe drawing, I produced the image using a CNC vinyl cutter; I painstakingly reconstructed the spheres in the drawing by pressing pins or stitching wire into the existing wall. The obsessive handwork necessary to create these reliefs is immediately evident; this harkens back to the handwork of the original lace.

Designing something on a computer allows me to work outside of material space. The object becomes theoretical; it becomes a math problem, a series of vectors in space that are unencumbered by the laws of the material world.

I want to see what happens when I draw something in one kind of space and translate it into another. The two-dimensional and the three-dimensional trade places, back and forth. The work attempts a conversation between the exterior world (physical space, perspective space), and the interior world (a space of ideas, an invented space). I want to create something that is impermanent, fragile, and labored. I hope to pose questions about what is real and what is imagined.

Jeanne Quinn is creating contemporary work that is deeply rooted in the history of ceramics. Quinn’s recent works draw inspiration from baroque, decorative textiles to recreate patterns that not only reflect her skills in the craft, but also allow viewers to apply their imagination to it. In her work, one finds a sense of humanity and humor that makes Quinn’s unique installations connect with the viewer.

Jeanne Quinn received her undergraduate degree cum laude in art history from Oberlin College; she recieved her MFA in ceramics from the University of Washington. She has exhibited widely, including the Museum of Contemporary Art, Denver; Robischon Gallery, Denver; Grimmerhus Museum, Denmark; Formargruppen Gallery, Malmö, Sweden; Sculpturens Hus, Stockholm, Sweden; and the Taipei County Yingge Ceramics Museum, Taipei, Taiwan. She has been a resident artist at the MacDowell Colony, the Archie Bray Foundation, the International Ceramic Center in Denmark, and the Kahla Porcelain Factory and the Ceramic Center-Berlin in Germany.

Her work is included in the books The Artful Teapot, by Garth Clark; Postmodern Ceramics, by Mark Del Vecchio; Sex Pots, by Paul Matthieu; A Ceramic Continuum: Fifty Years of the Archie Bray Influence, by Peter Held, and Confrontational Ceramics, by Judith Schwartz. She has lectured widely at institutions such as UCLA, USC, the Kansas City Art Institute, the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, the University of Minnesota, Alfred University, and many others.

Jeanne Quinn
Artist Statement
Floating

Floating questions our sense of two basic materials—textiles and ceramics—in order to shift our understanding of the world of matter to a more conceptual register. By asking, "what makes a textile a textile?" and "how do we know ceramic is ceramic?" my work promotes a poetic interpretation of matter that both challenges and affirms a phenomenological understanding of the world. I hope that viewers will reconsider their assumptions about materials, leading them to attend to their own direct, sensual experiences.

Through suspending hundreds of ceramic objects, the whole takes on the capacity for softness and movement associated with textiles; the scale also envelops the viewer, disrupting her sense of space and the relationships between objects.

This past summer, I made a series of drawings of lace. With a long-standing interest in the language of pattern, I began considering how a drawing of lace captures its repetitive patterning, but also how that pattern is distorted because of the nature of fiber. The repetition is never exact. Textiles move, negative spaces change shape. This makes the object, and the space it occupies, come alive.
Decorative surfaces in ceramics have a long history of borrowing from textile patterns. This installation pulls ornament off the surface and pushes it into space. I have made objects that isolate and celebrate aspects of ornament, arranging them so that space itself becomes the place of decoration. This transforms the installation into a stage, the viewer into an actor.
As we move away from a traditional Euclidean understanding of space toward spatial ideas based on networks, textiles become a useful metaphor for examining relationships between elements, as opposed to examining elements in isolation. Ceramics, which we understand as immutable, nonetheless fails to "fix" space when used in a manner that imitates textiles.
In Floating, I have created an installation based on an Italian lace pattern from the eighteenth century. It is also a porcelain chandelier. The piece alludes to the history of decorative arts, but takes decoration—usually thought of as superficial embellishment—and transforms it into the subject. Ornament is unencumbered, and is used to shape space. The objects create an installation that references multiples, materiality, and the body. I attempt to examine material culture through the disruptive lens of installation art.

Jeanne Quinn is creating contemporary work that is deeply rooted in the history of ceramics. Quinn’s recent works draw inspiration from baroque, decorative textiles to recreate patterns that not only reflect her skills in the craft, but also allow viewers to apply their imagination to it. In her work, one finds a sense of humanity and humor that makes Quinn’s unique installations connect with the viewer.

Jeanne Quinn received her undergraduate degree cum laude in art history from Oberlin College; she recieved her MFA in ceramics from the University of Washington. She has exhibited widely, including the Museum of Contemporary Art, Denver; Robischon Gallery, Denver; Grimmerhus Museum, Denmark; Formargruppen Gallery, Malmö, Sweden; Sculpturens Hus, Stockholm, Sweden; and the Taipei County Yingge Ceramics Museum, Taipei, Taiwan. She has been a resident artist at the MacDowell Colony, the Archie Bray Foundation, the International Ceramic Center in Denmark, and the Kahla Porcelain Factory and the Ceramic Center-Berlin in Germany.

Her work is included in the books The Artful Teapot, by Garth Clark; Postmodern Ceramics, by Mark Del Vecchio; Sex Pots, by Paul Matthieu; A Ceramic Continuum: Fifty Years of the Archie Bray Influence, by Peter Held, and Confrontational Ceramics, by Judith Schwartz. She has lectured widely at institutions such as UCLA, USC, the Kansas City Art Institute, the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, the University of Minnesota, Alfred University, and many others.

MS 297 in Manhattan is a focus school, where over half the students have Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). The public art site was the lobby ceiling, allowing students who found the piece overstimulating to look down as they crossed the space. Rather than accommodating students with ASD, I wanted to engage their gifts. A skill common in these students is extraordinary visual acuity. I designed the piece using mirror image symmetry rotated in 3 dimensions. It’s difficult to perceive, but I imagined a child walking through that space day after day, realizing the pattern over time.

People with ASD often suffer from sensory processing challenges as well. Loud noises and bright lights can be incredibly disruptive to them, making it difficult to self-regulate. Not surprisingly, being in a natural setting can be very calming to this population, as it is to all of us. While I told the committee that my dream would be to create a live hanging garden, various constraints disallowed that possibility. Nonetheless, the space is flooded with natural light, and my translucent natural forms simulate light filtering through green leaves.

The school is also a space that is actively used by neighborhood groups. The neighborhood was the center of New York’s printing trade in the 18th and 19th century. Historically, printers were also graphic designers, inventing unique “printer’s ornaments” used to decorate chapter headings, title pages, and the like. I wanted to acknowledge local history, and used ornaments designed by past printers working in the neighborhood as sources for the hanging ornaments in the piece. I found catalogues of printer’s ornaments from the neighborhood, and turned them into 3-d ornaments made in translucent resin. I chose ornaments invoking the natural world to bring these two inspirations—the needs of people using the space, and the history of the neighborhood—into a unified design.

Working on this project involved conversations with the various stakeholders: neighborhood representatives, school administrators, architects, contractors, and public art administrators. Being New York City, they represented diverse backgrounds and ethnicities. It was a joy to work with this team, and to incorporate many suggestions and improvements to the project. They were thrilled with a project that celebrated their students’ strengths, while also speaking to local history.

"Rivers flow not past, but through us; tingling, vibrating, exciting every cell and fiber in our
bodies, making them sing and glide." - John Muir

Confluence Park brings together two rivers, the South Platte and Cherry Creek. It is also an urban park, a place where nature and city life are married; Fifteenth Street and Speer Boulevard run on either side of the park, operating as urban rivers.

I was inspired by landscape architect William Wenk's desire to bring people down to the level of the water, to entice them to the confluence, with his design for the park. I thought about what might draw people to the water. I decided to employ narrative-- when we read, we want to find out what happens next. I found this text by John Muir, the great environmentalist, and thought it spoke beautifully to the idea of rivers converging with us, that we become the river. We are, in fact, inseparable from our environment.

I used this text over an image of a river, divided into eleven panels, to flow down the ramp that leads to the river. The image is created using glass mosaic. As one walks down the ramp, the image of the flowing river leads down, and the Muir text embedded in the river image helps us anticipate the wonder and joy of the river itself.

In addition to the panels, there are seven large concrete "bubbles," covered with glass mosaic, at the top of the ramp. The largest is 30" in height, and they join one another in playful groupings. They are a place to rest and to play, to see where one might access the river, and enjoy the view from above.

A THOUSAND TINY DEATHS
Artist statement
Jeanne Quinn

Ceramics is metamorphic. Its properties transform miraculously from soft and infinitely malleable to immutable and unchanging. After taking on this permanence, however, it also acquires one quality that we try to suppress: it breaks. Ceramics is contradictory, simultaneously ineradicable and fragile.

In A Thousand Tiny Deaths, I have suspended ceramic vessels using breath, contained inside balloons. I hope that the precariousness of the situation helps us see that we, like these objects, occupy time that is both charged and limited.

Jeanne Quinn is creating contemporary work that is deeply rooted in the history of ceramics. Quinn’s recent works draw inspiration from baroque, decorative textiles to recreate patterns that not only reflect her skills in the craft, but also allow viewers to apply their imagination to it. In her work, one finds a sense of humanity and humor that makes Quinn’s unique installations connect with the viewer.

Jeanne Quinn received her undergraduate degree cum laude in art history from Oberlin College; she recieved her MFA in ceramics from the University of Washington. She has exhibited widely, including the Museum of Contemporary Art, Denver; Robischon Gallery, Denver; Grimmerhus Museum, Denmark; Formargruppen Gallery, Malmö, Sweden; Sculpturens Hus, Stockholm, Sweden; and the Taipei County Yingge Ceramics Museum, Taipei, Taiwan. She has been a resident artist at the MacDowell Colony, the Archie Bray Foundation, the International Ceramic Center in Denmark, and the Kahla Porcelain Factory and the Ceramic Center-Berlin in Germany.

Her work is included in the books The Artful Teapot, by Garth Clark; Postmodern Ceramics, by Mark Del Vecchio; Sex Pots, by Paul Matthieu; A Ceramic Continuum: Fifty Years of the Archie Bray Influence, by Peter Held, and Confrontational Ceramics, by Judith Schwartz. She has lectured widely at institutions such as UCLA, USC, the Kansas City Art Institute, the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, the University of Minnesota, Alfred University, and many others.

Everything Is Not As It Seems
Artist Statement
Jeanne Quinn

In Richard Wagner's 1849 essay "The Artwork of the Future," he presents the idea of the gesamtkunstwerk: the complete work of art. I have always loved this idea of being able to create something sensually encompassing, as Wagner attempted with his own work. The decorative arts, referred to in German as kunsthandwerk, in some sense have always provided the possibility for the total work of art.

The decorative arts are the arts of domestic space and they surround us completely: textiles, wall coverings, carpets, furniture, lighting, vessels of all kinds, and every other thing that covers a wall or ceiling or floor or that we use in everyday life. I like to think of my pieces as Gesamtkunsthandwerks, in which I attempt to combine multiples that reference traditionally decorative objects into sensually encompassing installations. In the decorative arts of the past, as well as contemporary installations, the viewer becomes a participant in, and actually enters in to the work of art.

The Jane Hartsook Gallery at Greenwich House reads as a parlor space with its hardwood floors, marble fireplace, and tall windows. It provides a space to explore some of these ideas about the decorative arts, bridging the gap between public exhibition space and domestic space. For my exhibition, I have made a room-sized porcelain chandelier installation, alluding to the history of the space as a parlor and the decorative objects found there, but re-shaping these elements into a contemporary installation that references multiples, materiality, and the body.

Jeanne Quinn is creating contemporary work that is deeply rooted in the history of ceramics. Quinn’s recent works draw inspiration from baroque, decorative textiles to recreate patterns that not only reflect her skills in the craft, but also allow viewers to apply their imagination to it. In her work, one finds a sense of humanity and humor that makes Quinn’s unique installations connect with the viewer.

Jeanne Quinn received her undergraduate degree cum laude in art history from Oberlin College; she recieved her MFA in ceramics from the University of Washington. She has exhibited widely, including the Museum of Contemporary Art, Denver; Robischon Gallery, Denver; Grimmerhus Museum, Denmark; Formargruppen Gallery, Malmö, Sweden; Sculpturens Hus, Stockholm, Sweden; and the Taipei County Yingge Ceramics Museum, Taipei, Taiwan. She has been a resident artist at the MacDowell Colony, the Archie Bray Foundation, the International Ceramic Center in Denmark, and the Kahla Porcelain Factory and the Ceramic Center-Berlin in Germany.

Her work is included in the books The Artful Teapot, by Garth Clark; Postmodern Ceramics, by Mark Del Vecchio; Sex Pots, by Paul Matthieu; A Ceramic Continuum: Fifty Years of the Archie Bray Influence, by Peter Held, and Confrontational Ceramics, by Judith Schwartz. She has lectured widely at institutions such as UCLA, USC, the Kansas City Art Institute, the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, the University of Minnesota, Alfred University, and many others.

ARTIST STATMENT: "True and Reasoned" was commissioned for the exhibition "Flow" at the Milwaukee Art Museum. I designed it with the architectural space in mind— Santiago Calatrava's stunning building for the Milwaukee Art Museum. The space where it was exhibited had a skylight just above the piece (there’s a detail showing the light shining down on the piece, at the top), and behind the work, as you stood to look at it, was a huge window looking out to Lake Michigan. The light changed all day long. The cut vinyl silhouettes in the piece, which are clear matte vinyl, were at times completely invisible, at times looked like shadows on the wall, and at times reflected glowing light and seemed to hover in space. The steel frames and hanging porcelain elements sometimes had strong shadows on the wall, and sometimes seemed to float.

My work, for years, has concerned itself with symmetry. I’m interested in symmetry’s relationship to beauty, as a reflection of the self or the other, and as an idea about perfection. As I’ve worked with it over the years, my play with symmetry has become more nuanced and playful. In this piece, I wanted to create a marriage of many opposites: black and white, two dimensions and three dimensions, architectural and ornamental, etc.

There is an axis of symmetry in the center of the piece. The white steel frames each have a pair that mirrors it somewhere on the other side of the axis. In addition, each frame has a silhouette of the shape, cut from vinyl, that mirrors it directly across the axis— so the three-dimensional piece has its “reflection” in two dimensions, just as we ourselves are reflected in a mirror.

On top of the steel frames are hung elements from a piece of lace— I drew the lace, then turned each decorative element into an object, cast in porcelain and fired with a velvety black surface. So, the lace pattern is deconstructed and then hung, so that it can “flow,” over the steel frames and the wall.

Jeanne Quinn is creating contemporary work that is deeply rooted in the history of ceramics. Quinn’s recent works draw inspiration from baroque, decorative textiles to recreate patterns that not only reflect her skills in the craft, but also allow viewers to apply their imagination to it. In her work, one finds a sense of humanity and humor that makes Quinn’s unique installations connect with the viewer.

Jeanne Quinn received her undergraduate degree cum laude in art history from Oberlin College; she recieved her MFA in ceramics from the University of Washington. She has exhibited widely, including the Museum of Contemporary Art, Denver; Robischon Gallery, Denver; Grimmerhus Museum, Denmark; Formargruppen Gallery, Malmö, Sweden; Sculpturens Hus, Stockholm, Sweden; and the Taipei County Yingge Ceramics Museum, Taipei, Taiwan. She has been a resident artist at the MacDowell Colony, the Archie Bray Foundation, the International Ceramic Center in Denmark, and the Kahla Porcelain Factory and the Ceramic Center-Berlin in Germany.

Her work is included in the books The Artful Teapot, by Garth Clark; Postmodern Ceramics, by Mark Del Vecchio; Sex Pots, by Paul Matthieu; A Ceramic Continuum: Fifty Years of the Archie Bray Influence, by Peter Held, and Confrontational Ceramics, by Judith Schwartz. She has lectured widely at institutions such as UCLA, USC, the Kansas City Art Institute, the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, the University of Minnesota, Alfred University, and many others.

You Are The Palace, You Are The Forest
Artist Statement
Jeanne Quinn

Combining a tree with a chandelier may seem an odd logic.

My work investigates dialectics: fragility and permanence, the real and the imagined, matter and energy, the natural and the artifactual. Through the tree and the chandelier I ask questions about how internal and external space meet or converge.

I imagine the space created by these forms as both outdoor and indoor, as at once a forest and a great hall. The forest is a wilderness, an untamed place outside of our normal living space. It's the space where the sages go to meditate; it allows for internal experience. Anyone going there might hope to gain some kind of private revelation. The hall of chandeliers evokes grand, domestic, and exclusive space: perhaps a palace. In our time, most palaces have been transformed into public spaces. They have become places we go to understand something about larger questions of history or culture. Both the forest and the palace's great hall address internal and external worlds; I attempt to construct a space that allows for both kinds of awareness.

Jeanne Quinn is creating contemporary work that is deeply rooted in the history of ceramics. Quinn’s recent works draw inspiration from baroque, decorative textiles to recreate patterns that not only reflect her skills in the craft, but also allow viewers to apply their imagination to it. In her work, one finds a sense of humanity and humor that makes Quinn’s unique installations connect with the viewer.

Jeanne Quinn received her undergraduate degree cum laude in art history from Oberlin College; she recieved her MFA in ceramics from the University of Washington. She has exhibited widely, including the Museum of Contemporary Art, Denver; Robischon Gallery, Denver; Grimmerhus Museum, Denmark; Formargruppen Gallery, Malmö, Sweden; Sculpturens Hus, Stockholm, Sweden; and the Taipei County Yingge Ceramics Museum, Taipei, Taiwan. She has been a resident artist at the MacDowell Colony, the Archie Bray Foundation, the International Ceramic Center in Denmark, and the Kahla Porcelain Factory and the Ceramic Center-Berlin in Germany.

Her work is included in the books The Artful Teapot, by Garth Clark; Postmodern Ceramics, by Mark Del Vecchio; Sex Pots, by Paul Matthieu; A Ceramic Continuum: Fifty Years of the Archie Bray Influence, by Peter Held, and Confrontational Ceramics, by Judith Schwartz. She has lectured widely at institutions such as UCLA, USC, the Kansas City Art Institute, the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, the University of Minnesota, Alfred University, and many others.

"In her mixed media collages, Gunlock explores the restless intersection of nature and the built environment. She depicts trees with rugged branches and burly roots wrangling with residential facades, windows, gates and other architectural features. Gunlock captures a fleeting moment in this struggle, one in which nature and architecture seem to co-exist in a colorful equilibrium, if only for a moment. Gunlock alludes to historical patterns of overshoot, which are marked by excessive demand for natural resources, followed by eras of human decline and the slow recovery of forests and ecosystems. But in these works, Gunlock offers a vision of a hopeful future in which the built environment is woven sustainably into the natural world." - Al Grumet of Art Works for Change

Jennifer Gunlock's work explores the relationships between the objects of nature and those imposed upon them by human activity. By layering photographs taken on her travels, decorative papers and drawing, she constructs tree-based forms which are awkwardly fused with architectural motifs. Each composition reflects a long passage of time in which buildings and trees stretch and crumble, each pushing against the other. The work is a commentary on humanity’s direct impact on the environment, as well as Earth’s interminable shapeshifting over the long history of its existence.
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Based in Los Angeles, Gunlock has received an MFA at California State University, Long Beach in 2003. A 2022 recipient of the Pollock-Krasner Foundation grant, she has exhibited nationally and in local venues such as Sturt Haaga Gallery at Descanso Gardens, Los Angeles Municipal Art Gallery, Launch LA, and Angels Gate Cultural Center. She has been Artist in Residence at Cill Rialaig Project in Ireland; Playa in Summer Lake, Oregon; Brush Creek Foundation for the Arts in Saratoga, Wyoming; and at the Pajama Factory in Williamsport, Pennsylvania, among others. In 2014-15 Gunlock participated in “Fires of Change,” an NEA-funded collaboration between artists and scientists, to translate the social and ecological issues surrounding wildfire in the Southwest. Following a fire science bootcamp in the Grand Canyon, and a year to complete a project, a group exhibition opened at Coconino Center for the Arts in Flagstaff, Arizona in September 2015 and traveled to the University of Arizona Museum of Art in Tucson and 516 Arts in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

"In her mixed media collages, Gunlock explores the restless intersection of nature and the built environment. She depicts trees with rugged branches and burly roots wrangling with residential facades, windows, gates and other architectural features. Gunlock captures a fleeting moment in this struggle, one in which nature and architecture seem to co-exist in a colorful equilibrium, if only for a moment. Gunlock alludes to historical patterns of overshoot, which are marked by excessive demand for natural resources, followed by eras of human decline and the slow recovery of forests and ecosystems. But in these works, Gunlock offers a vision of a hopeful future in which the built environment is woven sustainably into the natural world." -Al Grumet of Art Works for Change

Jennifer Gunlock's work explores the relationships between the objects of nature and those imposed upon them by human activity. By layering photographs taken on her travels, decorative papers and drawing, she constructs tree-based forms which are awkwardly fused with architectural motifs. Each composition reflects a long passage of time in which buildings and trees stretch and crumble, each pushing against the other. The work is a commentary on humanity’s direct impact on the environment, as well as Earth’s interminable shapeshifting over the long history of its existence.

Jennifer Gunlock's work explores the relationships between the objects of nature and those imposed upon them by human activity. By layering photographs taken on her travels, decorative papers and drawing, she constructs tree-based forms which are awkwardly fused with architectural motifs. Each composition reflects a long passage of time in which buildings and trees stretch and crumble, each pushing against the other. The work is a commentary on humanity’s direct impact on the environment, as well as Earth’s interminable shapeshifting over the long history of its existence.

The work will take you on a captivating journey through Jennifer's unique perspective on landscapes, showcasing the way she disrupts traditional notions of nature and reimagines them in mesmerizing ways. It's exhibitions like these that remind us of the power of art to challenge our perceptions and inspire us to see the world through a new lens.

Gunlock is a 2022 recipient of the Pollock-Krasner Foundation grant.

Music is the genesis of Tim Bavington’s paintings. Through synthetic polymer paint, Bavington acts as a translator between the aural and the visual as he transforms guitar solos, melodies, and basslines into vertical bands of color. Although Bavington has a method that designates sound to color and composition, his works remain open to intuition and decision-making, allowing for a distinct artistic presence.

Watch a brief video of the artist discussing his work at: https://vimeo.com/229378384