What inspires the artist’s latest ceramic sculptures, in her own words
“The permanent nature of ceramics lends itself to containment of many sorts. I hope for my work to contain divergent qualities; sweetness and melancholy, lightness and weight. Over time, images I use have become proxies, tangible reminders of life’s plain and simple joys, as well as its bittersweet attendants—impermanence and loss. An ice cream cone, a gift bow, an old stuffed toy or the temporary moment a bird alights upon a snowball; each image permanently embodies an evanescent or ephemeral quality I seek to capture or hold still.
I’m influenced by poetry, where relationships between words and imagery shift and coalesce in such a way that something fresh or exciting is felt; what once felt common suddenly feels uncommon, what initially appeared ordinary strangely moves us. If, for a small moment, a configuration of objects I have arranged can be held onto as meaningful in a similar way—my work has achieved its aim.”
ABOUT THE ARTIST: Michaelene Walsh is an associate professor of art at Louisiana State University. Walsh’s sculptural ceramic work has been exhibited in galleries locally and nationally, and is featured in the sculpting masterclass book The Figure in Clay. Walsh will next have a show at Minneapolis’ American Pottery Festival in September.
