An annual benefit curated by Karen Karnes
December 5, 6, 7, 2008

The Art School at Old Church for directions and poster (see below).

Several top flight talents will have work at the show, including Karen Karnes, Joy Brown, Tim Rowan and Jack Troy.

Willi Singleton is opening his studio for anyone wishing to acquire aome of his beautiful work from his fall Firing. The Pine Creek Pottery is open on December 13 and 14 (Saturday and Sunday), 2008 from 12 noon to 6 pm. You can see examples of work on his website; you can inquire at 610.756.6387 or info@willisingleton.com.

Mark Hewitt has a kiln opening from his 75th firing. Previews are Friday, December 5, 4 pm–7 pm and sale days are Saturdays and Sundays, December 6, 7, 13 and 14, 2008. Saturday times are 9 am to 5 pm and Sundays, 12 pm to 5 pm. Previews and directions are available on his website.

by Lance Esplund, published in The Wall Street Journal, November 29, 2008
Alice Federico
George Billis Gallery
(511 W. 25th St.; 212-645-2621)
Through Dec. 20

In Alice Federico’s third solo show at George Billis, she continues to explore, and to reinvent, the classical Greek vase form in works roughly 18 inches high. Her slender, stately ceramic vases — brown, cream, green or gun-metal amphorae with wide lips, long necks and feet, and curved, swelling bellies — occupy that realm between functional object and sculpture. In this recent body of work, however, Ms. Federico has incorporated unusual handles. Sometimes decorative, sometimes practical, the handles give lift, haughtiness, personality and pomp-and-circumstance to her graceful hourglass forms.

The handles take on a range of associations. Many are symmetrical come-hither curves that add hands-on-hips punctuation. Others zip like lightning, pour slowly down the vases’ sides, or extend like flying buttresses. Others still, resembling bowties, leaves, cauliflower ears, fluttering ribbons, braids and wings, add whimsical notation and Baroque flair — at times elevating or steadying the vases’ necks like attending winged putti. Ms. Federico’s vases evoke classical antiquity; her handles bring those forms into the here-and-now.

By BENJAMIN GENOCCHIO
Published: November 28, 2008 in The New York Times

For the last two months, more than 65 museums, galleries, colleges, libraries and other organizations have been participating in a countywide celebration of artists who work with clay called All Fired Up! The project’s strength was its diversity, with works ranging from installations and sculpture to decorative and functional ceramics.

Charles Simonds’s “Mental Earth,” top, and Marek Cecula’s “Klepisko,” below.

Photos by Margaret Fox

Although All Fired Up! officially ends today, a hefty sampling of its bounty can still be seen at two of the larger exhibitions, “Conversations in Clay” at the Katonah Museum of Art and “Confrontational Ceramics” at the Westchester Arts Council’s Arts Exchange Gallery in White Plains. The two exhibitions include a total of more than 90 artists.

The shows differ in concept and presentation. The Katonah exhibition presents large-scale works by a handful of well-known contemporary artists who from time to time use clay; the show at the Arts Exchange Gallery is a somewhat overstuffed survey of socially minded objects by artists who are, for the most part, dedicated to ceramics.

I prefer the Katonah show, if only because the quality of art is more consistent, and since there are fewer works, it is easier to navigate. Organized by Ursula Ilse-Neuman and Janet Kardon, its overall theme is a celebration of clay’s remarkably versatile formal properties and widespread use and application in contemporary art.

Visitors of all ages will find much at Katonah to enjoy, beginning in the museum vestibule with Sana Musasama’s colorful, textured anthropomorphic tree forms made of ceramics and mixed media. Their visual strangeness and formal, experimental bravery suggest an artist striving for genuine originality. Perhaps they will bear fruit.

More anthropomorphic ceramic forms by Judy Moonelis fill the reception area, this time hanging from the ceiling and walls. These works take visual cues from human biology, as does a wonderful, spectacular installation in the opening gallery by Denise Pelletier. A metaphor for the flow of fluids in the human body, the installation combines flesh-colored porcelain molds of medical devices that measure, hold and conduct fluids with copper piping.

Among other notable displays here is Marek Cecula’s room-size installation. Mr. Cecula has constructed an entire floor out of dried, unfired clay, into which he has cut deep holes to reveal compressed clay representations of mundane domestic objects and items from our own time, entombed in the ground as if they were ancient relics. Walking on the clay floor and looking downward into the graves is a pretty eerie, pretty cool experience.

Equally thought-provoking is Charles Simonds’s monumental abstract object hanging from the ceiling in the front gallery. Made of clay, polyurethane, metal and wood, it looks like an asteroid floating in space, or possibly a giant gnarly tree root. It is beautifully finished, if you care to get up close to the menacing object and take a look.

The show at the Arts Exchange Gallery contains little work on such an ambitious scale. Instead, Judith Schwartz, the curator, has chosen artists who make ceramics that broach contemporary social, political, environmental and gender issues. In short, this is a show about ideas in which the artists just happen to be working with clay.

The works are arranged by theme, beginning with those that reflect on environmental issues. Among them is the installation “Tip of the Icebergs (Precious Cubes)” (2008), an allegory for global warming by Timothy Berg. It shows a bunch of penguins surviving on little chips of iceberg after the polar icecaps have melted.

The section devoted to the human and social condition is the largest in the show. Among those artists who stand out are Cynthia Consentino, Tim Roda, Becca Broughton and Elise Siegel, all of whom make figurative art of one sort or another. I was especially taken by Ms. Consentino’s animal figurines reflecting on gender stereotypes.

Upstairs are more works dealing with the environment and gender issues, as well as popular culture and war and political themes. Distorted figures and weird mutilated animals seem popular here, but there are also beautiful ceramic works that will appeal to those who, like me, prize a more sensual aesthetic.

Keep an eye out for Bonnie Seeman, a young and talented artist. Her work here, “Untitled Bowl” (2008), (left), is a tantalizingly lovely porcelain dish decorated with tiny glass and ceramic imagery of flowers, plants, sea forms and elements of the human anatomy, including muscle, cartilage and bone — a celebration of fecundity in nature.

Farther on is one of Jeff Koons’s white ceramic vases in the shape of a puppy, sold in editions, and a unique oddball installation by Eva Melas consisting of a cabinet-like structure filled with a mix of things she has found, bought and made out of ceramics. Looking at her cabinet of curiosities, it is difficult to tell what is real and what is not.

An excellent catalog written by Dr. Schwartz provides images, commentary on works and statements by artists. This is handy, for the show includes many younger artists who will probably not be familiar to visitors; I know several were new to me.

And that is what “All Fired Up!” is about in the end: pushing good, new ceramic artists forward.

“Confrontational Ceramics,” Westchester Arts Council’s Arts Exchange Gallery, 31 Mamaroneck Avenue, White Plains, through Dec. 11. Information: (914) 428-4220 or westarts.com.
“Conversations in Clay,” Katonah Museum of Art, 134 Jay Street, through Jan. 11. Information: (914) 232-9555 or
katonahmuseum.org.