Materiatrophy: Ceramics as a Site of Becoming
Through the alchemic process of forming and firing, ceramic objects register change while simultaneously transitioning toward permanence. Soft clay can inhabit an infinite number of forms, yet vitrification produces a state of fixedness that I find both unsettling and fascinating. As someone who understands identity as a perpetually evolving condition shaped by experience, I am drawn to the opportunity that the medium presents to hold tension between fluidity and rigidity. While ceramic materials move toward permanence, human beings remain in a continual process of becoming.
My thesis project, Materiatrophy, investigates this tension through accumulation, fragmentation, multiple firings, and collaboration with material. Incorporating studio detritus, abandoned experiments, discarded clay, and fragments from previous works, I explore how atrophied materials can be reactivated through transformation. These remnants function as records of earlier states of existence. Rather than discarding them, I reincorporate them into new sculptures, allowing traces of the past to remain visible within the present form. Assemblages of vessels, piles of clay, melting glaze, and footed pedestals emerge through an intuitive process of construction and reconstruction. Through repeated cycles of alteration and firing, the work explores how previous versions of ourselves persist within the ongoing formation of identity.
The vessel serves as my entry point into this inquiry. Historically associated with utility, containment, and familiarity, it offers a stable structure from which I can depart. At the beginning of this year, I was interested in the vessel primarily as a functional form. Over time, my relationship with it shifted. Through experimentation with accumulation, fragmentation, and repeated firing, the vessel became less important as an object and more significant as a site of transformation.
I am primarily drawn to the vessel due to its ability to hold. Traditionally, it is used to contain physical substances. Within my work, it functions as a container for less tangible experiences: memory, uncertainty, growth, and presence. The vessel provides a physical structure through which internal conditions can be externalized. Rather than representing the human body directly, it offers a site for material itself to engage in a process of becoming.
This interest has led me toward broader questions surrounding spirituality and presence. As I became more open to alternative ways of working with ceramics, I became curious about the medium's ability to record experiences that resist direct representation. The work of Heidi Lau has been particularly influential to my understanding of what ceramics can conduit. Her spirit vessels suggest that ceramic forms can act as sites where memory, spirit, and material coexist. While I am still developing my own understanding of spirituality, I have been interested in how ceramic funerary objects, like urns and reliquaries, point toward a longstanding human desire to create homes for memory and presence.
My process begins with handbuilt or wheel-thrown vessels that are made quickly and roughly—they serve as sketches to be developed further. During the greenware stage, they are altered and distorted as The forms begin to accumulate records of the environment in which they are made. Some are rolled across the studio floor, impressed with textures from nearby rocks, or embedded with fragments of broken ceramics. This stage remains intentionally playful and open-ended. Rather than pursuing a predetermined outcome, I allow discoveries to emerge through interaction with materials and conditions present in the studio.
Play functions as a methodology for discovery. By suspending the pressure to resolve forms immediately, I create opportunities for unexpected relationships to develop. The most meaningful moments in my process often arise when materials behave in ways that I could not have anticipated. These moments encourage me to respond rather than control. Working in this manner allows the sculptures to evolve through dialogue with material rather than through the execution of a fixed plan.
Following the bisque-firing, the vessel occupies an especially exciting state. It has been permanently transformed, yet remains porous and receptive to new material. in addition to the application of glaze, I embed the bisque-fired forms into wet piles of reclaim clay. The fired vessel retains its structure without disintegrating, while the surrounding clay shrinks, cracks, and pulls away as it dries. This interaction establishes a new relationship between the vessel and its material origin, offering a unique aesthetic that would be difficult to achieve in the greenware stage. What was once a unified material body begins to reveal tensions between permanence and change.
Cracks play an important role within these formations. traditionally, they are considered defects and signs of failure to be avoided or repaired. Within my work, they become evidence of material resistance and authorship. They reveal the limits of control and make visible the negotiation occurring between different states of matter. Rather than concealing instability, I embrace it as a record of transformation.
Fragments from previous works also find their way into new assemblages. Broken pieces, abandoned experiments, and discarded forms are incorporated alongside freshly formed elements. Their relationships are explored through pattern and layering before being physically joined through glaze and additional firings. earlier forms are not destroyed or erased, but carried forward into new assemblages.
This process mirrors my understanding of self-formation. Previous versions of ourselves remain present even as we change. Experiences accumulate. Old beliefs, failures, aspirations, and memories continue to shape who we become. The fragments embedded within my sculptures function as material analogues for this process. They persist within new forms without remaining unchanged.
Surface development extends this investigation. Layers of underglaze, slip, mason stain, and glaze accumulate over multiple firings. the use of various application techniques—Dripping, drawing, brushing, spraying, dipping, sifting, striping, and dotting—create opportunities for materials to interact in unpredictable ways. While the technical knowledge of my materials informs my decisions, I intentionally create conditions where surprise can occur. I find particular excitement in moments when glazes run, pool, drip, or combine unexpectedly. These interactions reveal possibilities that exceed my original intentions.
The kiln and firing atmosphere play an active role within this process. Heat, gravity, and structural constraints influence the final outcome of each piece. This dynamic has led me to think of the kiln as a collaborator. Its contributions often expand my understanding of what the material is capable of recording. specific moments, like a drop of glaze frozen on the edge of a downward-facing rim, inspire me to explore how I can adjust firing schedules to respond to particular formal circumstances.
Additional firings further complicate the relationship between control and uncertainty. to create assemblage forms, Fully vitrified fragments are balanced precariously together before re-entering the kiln. neither wet nor dried glazes serve as a reliable adhesive at this stage. Gravity becomes an active participant in determining what survives, shifts, or collapses. the composition of each form is finalized after the glaze has fluxed and begins to cool—unless I subject it to additional force or firings.
Arranged in groups of four on varying pedestal heights, the “finished” sculptures invite viewers to move slowly around them. Familiar vessel forms provide an accessible point of entry before giving way to the more ambiguous relationships between growth, decay, stability, and collapse. Dense accumulations of pattern, color, and texture encourage prolonged looking. Rather than presenting a single focal point, the work rewards sustained attention through small discoveries. A magical patch of melted glaze or an odd fragment embedded within a larger form may allow the viewer to feel engaged by a moment of self-discovery.
This emphasis on accumulation and contradiction is informed by several contemporary ceramic artists. Francesca DiMattio's sculptural assemblages have influenced my understanding of ornament, fragmentation, and instability. Her work combines disparate references and materials into forms that appear simultaneously beautiful and disruptive. I am particularly drawn to her ability to create sculptures that resist singular readings while maintaining a strong material presence.
The experimental processes of Masaomi Yasunaga have also influenced my approach to material inquiry. His unconventional use of rock, glass, and metal in relation to raw clay materials demonstrates how the process itself can generate conceptual meaning. Allowing material behavior to physically shape the work, he excavates forms made of glaze that were fired in beds of clay as if they are archaeological relics. This approach has encouraged me to leverage points of the ceramic process where material agency can contribute directly to form and meaning.
I am interested in developing more structure and conceptual clarity to ground my experimental, evolving process. Kathy Butterly's sustained engagement with the same slip-cast cup form offers an important model, as her commitment demonstrates how limitations can deepen inquiry. My thesis show was installed just as I was beginning to explore this new way of working, so I look forward to finding more intimacy with specific aesthetic moments and processes that felt exciting to discover.
Although I began the year without an intention to create sculptural work, following my curiosity beyond familiar methods transformed both my practice and my relationship to ceramics. I discovered that the medium offers more than a means of producing objects; it provides a process to externalize the intangible experiences of uncertainty, transformation, and becoming. By allowing previous forms to remain embedded within new ones, Materiatrophy reflects a belief that growth does not require abandoning the past. Becoming emerges through the continual accumulation and reconfiguration of what already exists. In both ceramics and human experience, transformation is rarely a process of replacement. It is a process of carrying previous states forward while remaining open to what might emerge next.
