This semester has started with a bang. I feel like the race horse jumping off the line at Churchill Downs. We are finishing up our third week and I don’t even know if I’m coming or going.
I’m having a wonderful time TA’ing the undergrad ceramics classes but it doesn’t mean I can’t make work. I’ve been working on some experimental pieces, coil structures, and slipcasting. At the moment, my most exciting piece is going to be a slip-cast hand with needles inserted that represent anti-covid vaccine alternatives. The hand will be decaying from the back end and it will be reaching for a covid vaccine.
Up until Covid, I wouldn't have considered myself an artist that influenced by the time/era in which I live. If anything, I'm an old soul who cares more about the crafted art of the 1940s-1960s. By this I mean, the craftsman furniture, pottery, and home design through the time when mid-century modern was prevalent. Their bold uses of color of shapes while wildly different than the craftsman style all included work that was well designed and handcrafted.
(But that's really a discussion for art v. craft.)
As I work on this current covid piece, I find it's a way to express myself and my views on the covid vaccine without having to yell and argue with someone who feels differently than I do. I'm lucky to be able to be expressive in a way that isn't just arguing on the internet.
I hope that my piece can make people uncomfortable and while I don't think it will change anybody's mind, it would be cool if it did.
I usually shy away from "political" pieces but living in a family with 6 other siblings and seeing my own family divided and people that I know are dying who were unvaccinated, I thought it was a great way to express my feelings and take a dig at the other side if it.
I know as soon as I post completed pictures of this, I will surely lose friends but that's part of the business of making art.