Sarah Rossi’s Self Portrait, 18 in. (46 cm) in height, white
stoneware, reduction, 2007, undergraduate, Rhode Island School of
Design.
Rachelle Guenther’s Whiskey Set, 11 in. (28 cm) in height,
porcelain, cone 10, 2007, undergraduate, SUNY New Paltz.
Amy
Goldsmith’s Untitled, 7 in. (18 cm) in diameter, porcelain, 2007,
undergraduate, Bowling Green State University.
Jenn Betts’ Bowl, 5 in. (13 cm) in height,
porcelain, 2007, undergraduate, Bowling Green State University.
Chrissi
Dewald’s Untitled, 36 in. (91 cm) in height, stoneware, 2006,
undergraduate, Temple University: Tyler School of Art.
Mariella Funk’s
A Place for Both of Us, 8 in. (20 cm) in height, earthenware, cone 04,
2007, Southern Illinois University Edwardsville.
Megan L. Mullins’ Yellow Grid: Along the Lines, 1½ in. (4 cm) in
height, engobe, unfired, 2006, graduate, University of
Massachusetts–Dartmouth.
Brooke Noble’s Set of Cups, 4½ in. (12 cm) in height,
porcelain, cone 10 soda, 2007, graduate, Southern Illinois University
Edwardsville.
Kelly McKibben’s Kitchen-Aid on a String, 17 in.
(43 cm) in diameter, earthenware, screen printed
slips, underglaze, cone 1, 2007, graduate, Southern
Illinois University Carbondale.
Bethany Rusen’s Caution House, 12 in. (30 cm)
in height, porcelain with underglaze, 2006, graduate, University of Massachusetts–Dartmouth.
| Kristen Kieffer:
The annual Regional Student Juried Exhibition held by NCECA is an
outstanding opportunity for undergraduate, graduate and special
students to begin showing their work, and during the largest ceramics
event of the year, at that. It provides a comparative glimpse for the
students, their professors and the field at large of the work being
made by accepted artists from the colleges and universities in that
given region.
In 1999, during my own first year of graduate school at Ohio
University, I had a piece juried into the RSJE in Columbus by Margaret
Bohls and Arthur Gonzales. It was very exciting to be accepted into the
show, so I was doubly honored to co-jury this past year’s RSJE with
Alleghany Meadows, having had a past connection with the exhibition.
I enjoyed the responsibility of being on the other side of the process.
The range of works submitted was impressive, covering almost every
ceramic genre, process, scale and style imaginable. It felt important
to do the obvious (choose the strongest pieces with promise), while
balancing the kind of work accepted. I wanted the show to be as diverse
as our subjective tastes and variety of submissions would allow. Two
studio potter jurors of similar approximate age and background could be
anticipated to have a narrow aesthetic interest, but I think the
resulting show proved otherwise. Several people told me at Pittsburgh
and after, that this year’s RSJE was one of the strongest exhibitions
at the conference, and while Alleghany and I can take a little credit,
those comments say something about the next group of emerging artists
coming on the scene.
Seeing work in person is, of course, very different than viewing its
picture on a computer screen, displayed with dimensions and a minimal
description. We both remarked about surprises in size or quality
(positive and not), when we first saw the show together in Pittsburgh
to decide the awards. This is probably when we realized our differences
in some aesthetic choices. Not all of the work accepted into the show
was mutually chosen. The accepted pieces were either ones we both
agreed on, or only one or the other of us accepted. (An artist with two
pieces in the show meant I picked one and Alleghany picked the other.)
Since we were purposefully not provided with information about any of
the students’ status, the ratio of undergrads, grads and special
students only became clear to us during this first walk through. There
may have been an understandably higher number of graduate students, but
all three categories were well represented in the exhibition.
When I told people I was a co-juror for this student show, I was
surprised when some either didn’t know it existed, or thought it was
the K–12 show. All college-level students should know about the RSJE
(which will change from a regional to a national show in the near
future), and submit work if they are eligible. The lack of interest or
knowledge was evident by the relatively low number of submissions. I
was expecting to look at closer to 1000 images, but only 242 students
from every eligible college or university possible in seventeen U.S.
states, the District of Columbia and six Canadian provinces submitted a
total of 432 works for jurying. Professors should press their students
to apply—as it is an excellent way to attract future students who can
easily compare schools by the quality and kind of work coming from the
program—and assist them in their applications. Most of the images we
reviewed were excellent, but some varied from mediocre to bad. If a
juror can’t tell the quality of the work because it is on a red fabric
background, poorly framed or lit or labeled with undescriptive text
(“clay and glaze” is not helpful), it will be declined. This should not
be happening, and I was dismayed to see it. Work that is photographed
and labeled well, and with multiple views, definitely gets more
attention.
It was a pleasure to see pots, tableware, large and small-scale
sculpture, wall pieces, figurative and mixed-media sculpture, minimal
and complex form, narrative work and tile being made in a region of
North America by some inspired students. Newer work by anyone (student
or not, young and old) has the potential of looking derivative of that
from a given professor or working artist. I was pleased by the absence
of distinct influence from this group of applicants. It’s obvious that
new and exciting art continues to be made in clay. Competition in the
field of ceramics just steepened again.
Kristen Kieffer is a studio artist and ceramics instructor living in
Massachusetts. Her work can be seen at www.kiefferceramics.com.
Alleghany Meadows:
The process of selecting works for the exhibition was both exciting and
challenging. Steve Hilton, the RSJE coordinator, the NCECA staff and
the staff of the hosting institution were incredibly helpful. It was a
pleasure to work with fellow juror Kristen Kieffer. The hundreds and
hundreds of images we first encountered presented a wide array of work,
from functional to figurative to site specific installation to mixed
media. Without consciously setting quotas for specific types of work,
we chose work representing the wide array of what was submitted.
Curating an exhibition without seeing the actual pieces or the
exhibition space is quite a challenge. When we arrived at the
exhibition and saw it completely installed, it was remarkable to see
the difference in actual scale, surface and form compared to the
perceived qualities we originally saw and juried from a computer
monitor.
The majority of the work we chose seemed to be idea driven. Perhaps
this is a fundamental tenet of work coming out of academic institutions
in the region for the 2008 student show. Ideas seemed to drive process
for most of the artists. This opened wide the possible ways for working
with the ceramic process, with clay being used from slip casting in
molds to colored slip trailed on plaster, wheel thrown to coil built,
press molded to pinched, and combinations way beyond. Much of the work
seemed incredibly labor intensive, with possibilities being explored
throughout each stage of the process. With some work, process became
language, like with the simplicity of a pinch pot, thin and
translucent, the penultimate “first” pot, but the process being taken
to an articulate level of communication, with conscious rhythm, touch
and form being investigated.
Some work was rooted in history, while other pieces drew from nature or
played with pop culture, political, narrative and conceptual content.
The depth and quality of the work was inspiring.
As a juror, I found myself in a great position to learn through this
experience. Perhaps the most poignant lesson came during the awards
selection process, during our first visit to the exhibition. When
selecting work for the exhibition, we did not know which schools or
levels of education the artists represented. Tasked with assigning
certain awards that were undergraduate and graduate specific, Kristen
and I struggled to choose works that belonged to each group. We had to
make educated guesses. To our surprise and rescue, a seasoned curator
and juror, Gail M. Brown, happened to be viewing the exhibition during
this process. She shared her insight, encouraging us to “look for work
which is raw and unrefined and full of potential” as a way to
distinguish between the two.
Alleghany Meadows is a studio potter in Carbondale, Colorado.
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Participating Schools
Alfred University, NYSCC, Alfred, New York
Bowling Green State University, Bowling Green, Ohio
Buffalo State College, Buffalo, New York
Edinboro University of Pennsylvania, Edinboro, Pennsylvania
Green Mountain College, Poultney, Vermont
Herron School of Art and Design, IUPUI, Indianapolis, Indiana
Illinois State University, Normal, Illinois
Indiana University Bloomington, Bloomington, Indiana
Juniata College, Huntington, Pennsylvania
Maryland Institute College of Art, Baltimore, Maryland
Miami University, Oxford, Ohio
Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, Illinois
The Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio
Ohio University, Athens, Ohio
Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania
Rhode Island School of Design, Providence, Rhode Island
Rochester Institute of Technology, Rochester, New York
School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Massachusetts
Southern Illinois University Carbondale, Carbondale, Illinois
Southern Illinois University Edwardsville, Edwardsville, Illinois
SUNY New Paltz, New Paltz, New York
Syracuse University, Syracuse, New York
Temple University: Tyler School of Art, Elkins Park, Pennsylvania
University of Akron, Akron, Ohio
University of Massachusetts-Dartmouth, Dartmouth, Massachusetts
University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee, Milwaukee, Wisconsin
University of Wisconsin–Whitewater, Whitewater, Wisconsin
Waubonsee Community College, Sugar Grove, Illinois |
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