1. Phyllida Barlow
Phyllida Barlow Examines the Art of Teaching. Frieze. Phyllida Barlow, 'Nairy Baghramian and Phyllida Barlow', 2010, installation view. Courtesy: the artist, Hauser and Wirth and Serpentine Gallery; photograph: Andy Keate [online] At: https://www.frieze.com/article/art-schools-phyllida-barlow (Accessed 24.12.2024)
Subject Matter: Monumental yet fragile sculptures, often made from inexpensive, everyday materials like wood, plaster, and cardboard. Her work explores the relationship between space, material, and viewer perception.
Responding to: Space and physicality; the instability of forms; the tension between impermanence and monumentality.
Contemporary Criticality: Her use of everyday materials challenges notions of value and permanence in sculpture. Her work resists traditional hierarchy and invites visceral, bodily responses.
How to Start a Conversation: I can reflect on her use of precarious materials and how it resonates with my themes of temporality and resilience. Also I might ask how she navigates the tension between fragility and monumentality in her works.
Phyllida Barlow achieves temporality and fragility by intentionally using everyday, unstable materials like cardboard, fabric, plaster, and polystyrene that naturally degrade or appear makeshift. She often leaves edges rough, lets paint drip, or stacks elements precariously, creating an impression of impermanence.
To reach monumentality, she contrasts these fragile materials with bold, oversized forms and aggressive construction methods like stacking, gluing, or binding wooden structures. Her process amplifies tension by making structures look as though they might collapse, but they hold together just enough to dominate the space.
2. Anselm Kiefer
Subject Matter: Large-scale paintings and installations addressing history, memory, and mythology. Often uses unconventional materials like lead, ash, and straw.
Responding to: The aftermath of history (particularly post-war Germany) and the weight of collective memory.
Contemporary Criticality: His layered materiality creates a sense of history embedded in the work, inviting viewers to reflect on personal and collective responsibility.
How to Start a Conversation: I might discuss how his material choices evoke memory and history and ask how he interprets material as narrative.
Anselm Kiefer uses materials like lead, straw, ash, clay, and tar to evoke memory and history. These materials carry symbolic weight—lead suggests heaviness and transformation, straw hints at decay and rebirth, and ash signifies destruction and renewal. He often incorporates found objects like books, burned remnants, or photographs into his works, creating layers of meaning.
By allowing materials to age, crack, or corrode, Kiefer interprets material as narrative, mirroring the processes of time and memory. Each material tells its own story, connecting personal and collective histories, particularly around themes like war, myth, and cultural identity.
3. Richard Serra
Subject Matter: Minimalist, large-scale steel sculptures that investigate space, gravity, and viewer movement.
Responding to: Industrial processes, materiality, and human interaction with scale and weight.
Contemporary Criticality: His work emphasizes physical presence and embodied experience, pushing viewers to feel the tension and balance between structure and vulnerability.
How to Start a Conversation: I’m asking him about the relationship between viewer movement and physicality in his work and how this might translate into emotional or intuitive reactions.
Richard Serra uses massive steel plates and curved forms to shape the viewer's movement and create a sense of physicality. His works require viewers to walk around and through them, making them acutely aware of their body in relation to the structure.
The towering scale, weight, and precarious balance of the materials evoke emotions like awe, tension, or disorientation. These physical interactions translate into intuitive reactions as viewers navigate shifting perspectives, tight passages, and open spaces, forging a visceral connection between movement, space, and feeling.
4. Joan Mitchell
Subject Matter: Abstract expressionism rooted in emotional intensity, gesture, and a deep connection to landscapes and personal memories. Her work is highly intuitive, often reflecting an emotional "gut feeling" in its composition and colour choices.
Responding to: Personal experiences, landscapes, and the unconscious. Her gestural marks and layering suggest a translation of internal affect onto the canvas.
Contemporary Criticality: Mitchell's ability to convey raw, pre-linguistic emotions through abstract forms resonates with my exploration of gut feeling and intuition, as well as the material agency of paint itself.
How to Start a Conversation: I can study her use of gesture and layering as a way to explore how external environments (nature, emotions) are internalized and expressed through intuitive abstraction.
Joan Mitchell used bold, expressive brushstrokes and layered paint to capture the feeling of nature and emotions rather than their exact appearance. Her gestures were loose and energetic, reflecting her emotional state and memories of landscapes.
By layering colours and textures, she created depth and movement, showing how external environments—like light, seasons, or personal feelings—were internalized and transformed into abstract, intuitive compositions. Each layer expressed a mix of past experiences and present emotions, making her work deeply personal and dynamic.
5. Julie Mehretu
Julie Mehretu, Of Other Planes of There (S.R.), 2018–19. Ink and acrylic on canvas, 108 × 120 in. (274.32 × 304.8 cm). Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; purchase with funds from Anna and Matt Freedman and an anonymous donor. Photograph by Tom Powel Imaging. © Julie Mehretu [online] At: https://whitney.org/exhibitions/julie-mehretu (Accessed 24.12.2024)
Subject Matter: Mehretu’s work often explores urban environments, history, and sociopolitical narratives through abstract layers of lines, marks, and colour.
Responding to: She responds to sociopolitical changes, globalization, and the structure of urban spaces. Her work acts as a map of collective memory and chaos, embedding external systems into her abstract, intuitive gestures.
Contemporary Criticality: Mehretu’s art navigates the balance between chaos and order, abstraction and specificity, addressing global and personal experiences. Her work resonates with themes of affect through its dynamism and layered textures.
Mehretu’s use of layers and marks to translate sociopolitical "external forces" into emotional, intuitive abstractions aligns with my interest in the transition from affect to intuition.
How to Start a Conversation: I may discuss how abstraction and material layers translate complex external systems into personal, embodied experiences in art.
Julie Mehretu begins by overlaying architectural drawings, maps, or blueprints onto the canvas. She then adds layers of paint, often using transparent sprays or washes, to create depth and atmosphere. Over this, she draws or paints gestural marks—arrows, lines, and scribbles—that mimic movement and energy.
By repeating this process of layering and erasing, she creates a dynamic interplay between structure and chaos. Her methods allow external systems (like urban planning or social networks) to dissolve into abstract forms, while her gestural marks make the work personal and emotional.
6. Katja Novitskova
Katja Novitskova, Pattern of Activation, 2014. Digital print on aluminum, cutout display; polyurethane, steel; aluminum, stainless steel, cutout display, 250 x 200 x 35 cm, trampoline and arrow sculpture, 145 x 250 x 200 cm. Courtesy of the artist, Kraupa-Tuskany Zeidler, Berlin. [online] At: https://cca.ee/en/artists-database/katja-novitskova (Accessed 24.12.2024)
Subject Matter: Novitskova works at the intersection of digital imagery, technology, and ecology. Her installations often involve large-scale prints, sculptural cutouts, and augmented environments.
Responding to: She responds to advances in digital imaging and environmental concerns, exploring how media shapes our perception of nature and reality.
Contemporary Criticality Novitskova critically examines the role of digital media in framing ecosystems, questioning the authenticity and impact of human intervention in nature. Her engagement with digital propaganda and mediated realities connects to my interest in how external forces shape our internal understanding.
How to Start a Conversation: I can discuss the parallels between her use of digital media to construct environments and my exploration of material agency and external forces in physical media.
Katja Novitskova uses digital media to create environments that feel alive, evolving through the interaction of images, technology, and virtual spaces. Her work often reflects the way digital elements interact with one another, producing a sense of constant change and movement. In a similar way, my exploration of material agency in physical media (like plywood, wood, and newspapers) looks at how physical materials are affected by external forces—such as time, touch, or destruction—and how they respond or change over time.
7. Berlinde De Bruyckere
Eine Skulptur von Berlinde de Bruyckere. (picture alliance / dpa – Peter Schneider) deutschlandfunk [online] At: https://www.deutschlandfunk.de/arbeiten-von-berlinde-de-bruyckere-angst-vor-der-eigenen-100.html (Accessed 24.12.2024)
Subject Matter: Figurative and abstract sculptures exploring vulnerability, suffering, and resilience, often using wax, wood, and organic materials.
Responding to: The fragility of the human condition, emotional trauma, and transformation.
Contemporary Criticality: Her works evoke empathy and discomfort, emphasizing the tension between the grotesque and the tender.
How to Start a Conversation: I will discuss how her use of materials translates emotional trauma into tangible forms and I might also ask how she reflects on pre-linguistic emotional responses.
Her sculptures often depict distorted, fragmented bodies or body parts, using the raw, tactile quality of these materials to evoke a sense of suffering and vulnerability. The way the materials are manipulated—soft wax can appear melted or broken, wood might be carved into twisted shapes—mirrors the impact of emotional pain, making it something viewers can physically feel or react to.
By using these materials, she reflects on pre-linguistic emotional responses—those feelings we experience before we can put them into words. Her work emphasizes how trauma is often too complex to express verbally, instead using materials to communicate feelings that are deeply rooted in the body and emotions.
8. Petra Cortright
Petra Cortright [online] At: https://www.contemporaryartcuratormagazine.com/home-2/petra-cortright (Accessed 24.12.2024)
Subject Matter: Cortright’s work spans digital painting, video art, and installations, often exploring the intersection of technology, aesthetics, and consumer culture.
Responding to: She responds to internet culture, digital interfaces, and the aesthetics of online life, transforming these into painterly forms.
Contemporary Criticality: Cortright challenges the traditional boundaries of painting and digital art, using software and algorithms as tools for creating contemporary landscapes.
Her translation of digital imagery into physical works echoes my exploration of transforming external forces into material, intuitive experiences.
How to Start a Conversation: Explore how her process integrates intuition and technology, and how she negotiates the relationship between the digital and material in her work.
Petra Cortright integrates intuition and technology in her works by blending digital tools with a spontaneous, instinctive approach to creation. She uses software like Photoshop to manipulate images, often starting with a free-flowing, intuitive process, where she allows the software to shape the final outcome. This approach allows her to explore digital spaces creatively, without strict control over every detail, letting chance and intuition guide her work.
Cortright often translates her digital works into physical forms, like prints or videos. This transition from the virtual to the physical creates a dialogue between the two realms. While her digital art is shaped by algorithms and pixels, her material works—such as prints or installations—bring that digital creation into the real world, emphasizing the contrast and connection between the immateriality of the digital and the tangibility of physical media.
9. Aneta Regel
Exhibition | Aneta Regel: “Gneiss” at Carpenters Workshop Gallery, Paris [online] At: https://cfileonline.org/exhibition-aneta-regel-gneiss-at-carpenters-workshop-gallery-paris-contemporary-ceramic-art-cfile/ (Accessed 24.12.2024)
Subject Matter: Regel creates organic, abstract ceramic sculptures inspired by nature and the human body.
Responding to: She responds to the tactile and sensory properties of clay, exploring transformation, texture, and form.
Contemporary Criticality: Regel’s works challenge conventional notions of ceramics, emphasizing its material agency and expressive potential.
Her focus on material transformation and intuition aligns with my interest in how materials mediate affect and create visceral responses.
How to Start a Conversation: It is interesting how she uses materiality and texture to evoke intuitive, pre-linguistic responses.
She often works with rough, organic textures to create a physical presence that feels raw and alive. The textures are carefully manipulated to provoke a visceral reaction—whether it's the smoothness of polished surfaces or the harshness of jagged, unrefined edges.
These textures invite viewers to engage with the work on a sensory level, before words or concepts come into play. The materials' physical qualities, like weight, roughness, or softness, evoke emotional reactions linked to bodily experiences, such as discomfort, comfort, or tension.
10. Neil Brownsword
Neil Brownsword, Relic 2, 2010. Mixed materials, 10 x 28 x 27 cm oxford ceramics [online] At: https://www.oxfordceramics.com/artists/262-neil-brownsword/works/5461-neil-brownsword-relic-2-2010/ (Accessed 24.12.2024)
Subject Matter: Neil Brownsword’s practice revolves around the decline of traditional ceramic industries and the labour associated with their production. He incorporates discarded industrial ceramics, factory debris, and historical objects into his sculptures and installations, creating works that are both a critique and an homage to craft traditions. Brownsword often highlights the tension between handmade craftsmanship and industrial mass production.
Responding To: Brownsword responds to the historical and socio-economic shifts in ceramic production, particularly in his native Stoke-on-Trent, once a global hub of ceramics. His work critiques the effects of industrial decline on local communities and the devaluation of manual labour in favour of mechanization and globalization.
Contemporary Criticality: Brownsword’s work is critically relevant as it addresses themes of sustainability, labour ethics, and the cultural value of craft in an era dominated by mass production. His practice also raises questions about material memory and how objects carry the histories of their creation and use. By repurposing debris and fragments, he challenges viewers to reconsider the worth of what is discarded, both materially and socially.
He often works with techniques that require extensive manual labour, such as hand-building and firing, to emphasize the effort involved in crafting each piece. In some works, he incorporates industrial methods, blending them with handmade elements to critique the mass production of ceramics while celebrating the unique value of handcrafted objects.
He also highlights the human labor behind ceramics by creating pieces that reference or replicate factory-made objects, using materials like clay to challenge the idea of mass production.
11. Rebecca Appleby
Rebecca Appleby Featured work, Selected works, 2019-2020 Ceramics Now [online] At: https://www.ceramicsnow.org/rebeccaappleby/ (Accessed 24.12.2024)
Subject Matter: Rebecca Appleby’s work examines the intersection of the organic and the industrial, exploring tensions between fragility and resilience. Her ceramic sculptures incorporate industrial materials like steel and concrete, creating a dialogue between soft, malleable clay and rigid, industrial elements. Appleby often focuses on abstract forms that evoke architectural or natural structures, using texture and composition to convey movement and balance.
Responding to: Appleby responds to the evolving relationship between humanity and the built environment, as well as the fragility of ecosystems in the context of industrialization. Her work is a commentary on the juxtaposition of natural and human-made worlds, reflecting societal shifts toward urbanization and sustainability.
Contemporary Criticality: Her work is contemporary in its exploration of hybridity and material agency. By combining ceramics with industrial elements, Appleby challenges traditional notions of ceramics as purely decorative or utilitarian. Her practice addresses critical concerns about environmental fragility, industrial decay, and the permanence of materials in a rapidly changing world. The juxtaposition of fragility and strength offers viewers an emotional and tactile experience that bridges affect and reflection.
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