Through referencing specific objects and vessels found in the home, I want to connect my work with viewers personal experiences. Our domestic spaces, like an overlooked corner of a living room or a catch-all windowsill next to a reading chair, can talk about very tender moments of our lives, either of introspective moments or relationships with loved ones. I hope to explore that space just under the surface of familiarity through formal elements like color, texture, line, as well as, referencing specific vessels commonly found in our everyday lives. My work becomes the expression of intimacy of the home, and how aspects of our domestic life might be uncomfortably sensitive but universal.  

​

The forms I have been exploring through a rich, red terracotta clay body are vessels found in the domestic realm of our lives. These vessels, such as dish racks, laundry baskets, or containers for storage, are an inherent, inescapable part of our lives when it comes to the home. Forms are handbuilt from terracotta to utilize the historically commonplace status of red clay. Each piece is pinched to create imbue forms with a soft touch. Functional work is decorated with patterns that are commonly found in everyday kitchen objects like depression glass, tea towel designs, and plastic storage vessels. A textural and tactile surface is created through stamping shapes into clay and using small press molds to add clay for a low relief pattern. While line quality is also emphasized through cutting out shapes in forms to make utilitarian baskets.

 

The everydayness of the objects speaks to the amount of attention we lack to give them. They are common, easily replaced, and readily forgettable when it comes to how we relate them to our lives. Yet, these objects are unquestionably needed while also representing decisions that reflect our own daily needs, design tastes, and aspects of our personalities. Maybe this starts a conversation between a viewer and their things, or the space they live to think deeper about how we are connected to the objects that exist in the home, or maybe it is reminiscent of feelings of a childhood home. Ultimately, these domestic vessels reference what is actually found in our homes on a daily basis: a compilation of time, material things and memories.