As an artist it seems that I am forever writing artist statements to go with whatever piece of work that I am exhibiting at the time. These statements are important, in that they give total strangers a glimpse into the ideas behind the work, as well as a bit of information about me the artist. Sometimes I can write an artist statement in about two minutes flat and it is beautiful, other times I struggle with the words and the statement sounds a bit wanky.
I have needed to write a bio for the Off Centre Gallery for ages now and I keep on forgetting about it.
So here we go my lovelies I am going to put it up here and you can tell me what you reckon. I welcome any grammatical corrections as my sentence structure is a bit wonky.
My name is Kim Foale and I am a Ceramic Artist. I fell in love with clay over twenty years ago but life and children intervened. I spent most of the nineties and early noughties raising my children and helping my husband build our home from recycled materials.
When my eldest child went to college she dragged me along with her and I rediscovered my love for clay. I have been working towards a diploma of ceramics, part time since 2006.
Josiah Wedgwood the father of industrialised pottery production is quoted as saying, ” I will turn men into machines.” My work is made in direct response to the factory produced ceramics that you can find in any large department store.
I am not a machine. I deliberately leave fingermarks in the glaze, somewhere within my work and they are most evident at the base of my tall cups. My edges are uneven on purpose and I put a lot of time and thought into each individual piece. I make one off original art pieces, generally with an environmental story to them. I fire in reduction as well as oxidation and I like to use stone or bone tools when I am working, as my clay responds better to these natural materials.
The more I learn about ceramics the less I realize I know and I am happy to be a perpetual student of my craft.
You can find out more about me on my personal blog frogpondsrock.com
Comments on this entry are closed.
I think that sums you up quite nicely Kim, covers just about everything. Although possibly not your amazing ability to make Art from every minute of your life – good, bad or indifferent – using a multitude of media in addition to ceramics.
This may be nit-picking but . . . do you mean noughties rather than naughties? Although I accept that you may have been very naughty in the noughties 😉
oops yes Sharon I did mean the noughties, I will fix that right now 🙂
You spent the early naughties raising children? *tee hee*
Something got lost in the translation into Standard American. But I like how you included your strangely unique home in the bio, and the pic. 🙂
Perfect, Kim 🙂
You’re very good at these 🙂
Sweetie, that’s a damn fine intro to you and your work.
If I was inclined to be picky (and I’m not), I’d suggest that the years ’00 are normally written as Noughties (but I like your version much better – makes them sound more fun than they were 😉 ), and that ‘one-off’ is usually hyphenated, and that a couple of commas wouldn’t go astray in places – but frankly, it’s lovely as stands. Like you. 🙂
And you can tell, since I was behind the times about the Noughties comment, that I have had this sitting in my browser all day… LOL. Still like the original better. 😉
It’s a great statement Kim, it describes you and your work perfectly.
I love the purple in your hair!
I love this post. Its in direct contrast to my last!
I love that you have identity.
You are an artist.
Hey, I know an artist.
Yes. Good statement. It’s informative and thought-provoking…you noughty, noughty girl!
Loved every word of it. Ooooh and I LOVE that photo!