Ceramics Faculty

Christyl Boger, Assistant Professor

cboger@indiana.edu
www.chrisbogerart.com
I have always been interested in the strange balancing act that is life of the social human animal: in impulse and control, individual vs. group, the fragile and the vulnerable veneer of our shared cultural behavior Finding a physical form for these thoughts has involved incorporating two additional parameters. The first is a concern for the issues of representation which necessarily arise with the decision to work figuratively. The second is a commitment to the contemporary possibilities of the ceramics medium, with all of its complex associations. My intent has been to explore the areas where these concerns intersect. The resulting work expresses a psychology of the “domestic” figure. It draws an equation between the figure and the decorative ceramic object to create a metaphorical representation of a human subject shaped by codified social and cultural traditions yet conflicted by the pull of unnamable desires.

Tim Mather, Director of SoFA, Associate Professor

tmather@indiana.edu
My current work is made using ceramic casts of found objects. I am using such things as plastic packaging, plumbing fixtures, toys, plastic bottles, watering cans, machine parts, hardware items, sticks, and a general array of flotsam and jetsam–the list becomes longer all the time. I construct objects using these castings by creating improbable juxtapositions of these found forms. I am seeking to stretch the imagination and to provoke a reconsideration of the extended possibilities of meaning and metaphor in the “stuff” that surrounds us on a daily basis.

Amy Norgaard, Visiting Assistant Professor

anorgarr@indiana.edu
Wonder leads me to my “toy box” full of slip cast parts. Organizing clay parts determines the matrix of each sculpture: teapot, toy or mechanical invention. Daily objects become cast parts.  The variety of ubiquitous water bottles, juice bottles, formed plastic packaging and other simple objects relating to basic shapes develop my mold library. Selecting particular objects that fit the matrix sets the stage for the development of interdependent relationships among the parts; identifying a spout, or the defining handle, the form begins to take shape. When the shape of a found object becomes part of another, I recognize the absurdity of their assumed meaning. This moment of realization is when the form is removed from the transparency of the individual parts and becomes a whole. My forms are developed similarly to the organization of a jigsaw puzzle, each part dependent on the next to complete the whole; limited by the initial matrix, yet not by a picture on the box.

Malcolm Smith, Associate Professor

malmsmit@indiana.edu
www.malcolmmobutusmith.com
In my studio, I am involved in the manipulation of wheel thrown and hand built elements. I strive for a combination of – traditional ceramic vessel forms quoted from the clay histories of a variety of cultures. Quotes also from the formal world of the two-dimensional, aspects of graffiti art, modern and post modern idealogies of art making coupled with an exploration in what line and form mean to each other by “drawing” in space with pots. This is fleshed out by my interest in jazz internalization, the urban subcultures of Hip hop’s expressiveness and an awareness of my multi-ethnicity within world art. With this variety of creative vernacular I wish to create the poly-lingual effect of a multi-dimensional hopscotch.

John Goodheart, Professor Emeritus

goodhear@indiana.edu
John Goodheart, Professor Emeritus says the following about his work. “The forms I produce suggest function but in a manner that is mysterious as many cultural artifacts are out of context and displaced in space and time. I enjoy the ambiguity and mystery created when my pots allude to use or some process yet do not fully reveal what that use or process is. The success of my work is therefore dependent upon its ability to stimulate the imagination, vacillating between a state of uncertainty and wonder.”