Visiting Artist Workshop: Michelle Erickson @ Harvard Ceramics
Presented by Ceramics Program
Location: Ceramics Studio, 219 Western Ave, Allston
How to get tickets: 
Thursday 2/28 10:00 AM
Performance Detail:
Download the workshop registration form here.
Thursday, February 28th
Workshop: 10:00am – 4:00pm
Slide Presentation: 5:00pm – 6:00pm
Internationally recognized for her mastery and reinterpretation of historical ceramic technique, Michelle Erickson
joins us for a day of demonstration and slide presentation of her work.
Her contemporary work makes use of arcane ceramic techniques to create
historical narratives about political, social and environmental issues –
both past and present. Regardless of time frame, Erickson’s works are
distinguished by insightful commentary on the universal character of the
human spirit. Recently returned from a three-month, artist residency
at The Victoria and Albert Museum, Erickson will share her experience in working amongst 5000 years of clay traditions represented as documented in her
blog.
Her highly sought creations are in the collections of major museums in
America and England and documented in several volumes of the annual
journal Ceramics In America.
“Endeavoring to rediscover the techniques once used by these potters
during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries has spurred years of
experimentation. In the course of this technological investigation, I
also develop an awareness of the broader historical contexts surrounding
these potting traditions. My approach has always challenged
traditional explanations and conceptions about pre-industrial ceramics
and the methods used to create them. I have sought to find the original
language of the artifact itself to make a tangible connection to the
present. Physically recreating these lost processes reinforces the
irreplaceable significance of the hand even in the technological
landscape of the twenty-first century.”
Related Events
February 20th, 2013 – July 14, 2013
Exhibiting artist at the “New Blue and White” Exhibition at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Foster Gallery, 158.
Wednesday, February 27, 2013
Featured speaker at “Two-Point Perspective Gallery Talk” entitled,
Influence and History: Blue and White Chinese Ceramics with Robert D.
Mowry, Alan J. Dworsky Curator of Chinese Art, Division of Asian and
Mediterranean Art, Harvard Art Museums and Melissa A. Moy, Cunningham Assistant Curator of Asian Art, Division of Asian and Mediterranean Art, Harvard Art Museums.
Ongoing
Erickson’s work has been represented by the Ferrin Gallery, Pittsfield, MA and the Lacoste Gallery in Concord, MA.
Artist’s Bio
Michelle Erickson is a graduate of The College of William and Mary
with a B.F.A. in Fine and Performing Arts. In addition to her
considerable contemporary ceramic work, Erickson has over twenty years
experience in working with 17th and 18th century reproduction pottery.
As owner of Michelle Erickson Pottery, Inc.,
she reproduces ceramics from archeological and acquired collections for
organizations such as Colonial Williamsburg, the National Park Service,
Parks Canada, the Museum of Early Southern Decorative Arts,
Philadelphia Museum of Art, and Historic Deerfield. She has lectured and
demonstrated her work widely for scholarly groups and institutions.
Examples of her contemporary work are in the collections of the Mint Museum of Craft and Design; The Museum of Art and Design, NY;
The Peabody Essex; The Long Beach Museum of Art;
the Milwaukee Art Museum; The Chipstone Foundation;
The New-York Historical Society; the
Potteries Museums, Stoke on Trent;
Yale University Art Gallery;
The Carnegie Museum of Art; and the
Victoria & Albert Museum, London. She has consulted on and designed ceramics for several major motion pictures such as The Patriot, The Time Machine, The New World and the recent HBO series John Adams.
Also Ms. Erickson has co-authored a series of articles Illustrating her
seminal work in the rediscovery of arcane ceramic techniques in the
prestigious annual journal
Ceramics in America edited by Robert Hunter and published by
The Chipstone Foundation, Milwaukee WI.
For more information on Michelle Erickson, please visit her website and
blog.
