Zhang’s work weaves in and around the intersections of design and craft fostering a practice within both Industrial Design and Ceramics. Fusing technology into traditional clay techniques, his pieces combine elements of furniture, sculpture, installation and experimentation. His forms are inspired from his travels, captured in his photography, from the mountains of Longmen Grottoes in Luoyang, China to the interior volcanos of Iceland. In Fall 2021, Zhang will enter the Global Innovation Design (MA) at Royal College of Art in London in hopes to further his aesthetic fusions and broaden expectations of what clay can do.
This series highlights the intersections of art, design, theory, social justice and research in interviewed conversations within the RISD community, its faculty and students.
Written | Directed | Edited by Holly Gaboriault [MA Global Arts + Cultures ’21]
The following quotes are from the Guardian Article by Dalya Alberge
“She was born into a working-class Staffordshire family in 1899 and was sent to work in the potteries aged just 13 before going on to become one of the country’s most influential ceramicists. Now Clarice Cliff has inspired a feature film that will show how she broke the mould in the pottery industry, revolutionising the workplace and bringing art to the masses with plates, jugs and teapots that were as affordable as they were colourful.”
“With the support of other women in the factory and Shorter, she went on to design her art deco Bizarre range, with abstract, geometric and figural forms. During the Great Depression, she ensured the factory’s survival and her future as one of the greatest art deco designers, becoming one of the first women to launch a line under her own name. She found inspiration in cubism and other artistic styles to create pieces adored by the public for their bright colours, vibrant patterns and innovative shapes, bringing modernity to the kitchen sink.”
“McCarthy said that Cliff, who died in 1972, rewrote the rules of “an entrenched hierarchical world”. “Modelling or designing was never territory where women were represented … at that time, there was a rigid understanding of how a person lived their lives. Particularly for women, the opportunities were very slim. Clarice was a beacon of change,” she said.”
Winnipeg-based ceramics artist Grace Han is searching for her true identity inside her clay creations. But what is her true, “real” self? For Han it’s ineffable, but she catches glimpses in her work. “I don’t think I’d be able to explain who the real Grace Han is, but when I do my ceramic *work* I don’t have to think about who I am. The body works and then something invisible turns into the energy and then the work captures that person at that moment.” “I discovered myself in my work.” When Han moved from South Korea to Winnipeg, she felt she became very quiet. “I wanted to hide,” she *tells* us. “I felt like I lost myself in a way. I just want to be myself, I want to find the Grace Han, the real Grace Han.” While she studied ceramics in Korea, she never felt she wanted to be an artist, but in Winnipeg she decided to dive in again. For Han, the materials of ceramics allow her to capture and present the different aspects of herself. With clay she shows the strong part of herself. “Clay can be very bold so with these big pieces I wanted to show the heaviness of the material and the boldness of myself.” On the other side of the ceramic spectrum is delicate porcelain which she uses to show the “meticulous and very detailed part of Grace.” Han’s latest project is a video performance captured in this episode of Art Is My Country that captures her evolution as a new Canadian artist. In the performance, she dresses in a traditional Korean dress and uses a traditional wheel to form her ceramic piece. “This dress it’s a metaphor for the expectations or responsibilities that I had to carry that I brought from Korea because this dress gives me lots of restrictions while I’m working.” As she works she removes pieces of the dress, symbolizing her own life’s cultural shift. “At the moment of creation I slowly take layers off so I can be free. I just want to be free from everything, expectations, pressure, just be myself.” Between these two countries, Han is coming to know her new self that is some of both and also neither. “These days whenever I go back to Korea I don’t feel I fit there anymore. I am becoming myself, not Korean Grace, not Canadian Grace I’m just becoming myself and now the frustration is gone.” At the end of her video performance, after she has built a beautiful new jar, she pushes it off the wheel, smashing it on the floor. “I can destroy the jar. My main goal was the process. The jar did its job today.”
What if a period room exposed a collector’s transgressions instead of burnishing their reputation? In the RISD Museum’s decorative arts wing, artist Beth Katleman has created a lavish porcelain room that tells the story of a disgraced antiquarian. The room is comprised of nearly 10,000 cast and handmade porcelain figurines, corporate mascots, and other pop culture icons. Katleman also created a short film called, “The Pleasures of Ownership,” in which two “citizen experts” lead a tour of the room, dropping hints about past indiscretions along the way.
