Cake as Influence

12 June 2008

4 Comments

From top left: Wayne Thiebaud’s painting Let Them Eat Cake; Painted Bird Cake, (a real cake) by Amanda Streeter; Floor Cake by Claes Oldenburg; and couture wedding cakes. Second row: another couture wedding cake; Wedding Cake by Wayne Thiebaud; a real wedding cake by Margaret Braun; a great blog entry from Trend de la Cremé pairing runway fashion with couture cakes; Third row: cupcakes by Dozen Cupcakes; architecture as cake; and Julia Jacquette’s painting White on White (Thirty-six sections of wedding cake, swans).

I started looking at wedding cakes eight years ago for decoration ideas. It seemed an obvious reference for me as slip-trailing (squeezing liquid clay through a bulb syringe) is the clay equivalent to cake-decorating.

I’m not sure when I first came across Wayne Thiebaud’s pastry paintings from the ’60s, but I love them. If I could paint, that is the style and possibly content I would choose. I enjoy his fantastical and exaggerated use of color (hard shadows of electric pink) and style that reminds me of the vintage ads I like. The paint is thick, and somehow simultaneously gestural and precise. Some of my influences are abstract ideas, and that last sentence would be a good example of something I see [in a Thiebaud painting, for example] that I would like to emulate in my work —a feeling, a presence.

I also just like the word, cake (the title of and text on the left tile, actually). I am drawn to the sound of certain words (Who doesn’t like to say rutabaga?), especially if they can have different meanings and contexts. I don’t know where I picked this up, but I sometimes use it as an expression to mean, “exceedingly lucky”. As in, “He is in a pretty cake situation since he married a millionaire,” for example.

I chose Claus Oldenburg’s Floor Cake to show because it fits today’s theme, and because I am drawn to his sculpture and drawing for making real, hard forms soft and humorous. Both elements I look to capture in my own work.

It may or may not be obvious from the images I chose above (and from my last post below): many of my influences overlap. In these things, I see hard and soft lines, humor, form, context and content. A couture dress looks like a tiered cake which looks like a Victorian home, which could be a covered jar—or maybe that’s just me. As I’ve said before, we artists are the blenders of the disparate creating the unified.

Influences: A Pictorial

6 June 2008

4 Comments

From top left: Oribe/Mino ware, George Nelson bubble lamps, Martin Johnson Heade paintings; (2nd row) bombé chests, imagery from vintage playing cards, Alphonse Mucha illustrations, Tord Boontje design, architecture and Victorian homes; (3rd row) Wayne Thiebaud pastry paintings, early 1900s fruit crate labels, Islamic brass forms and patterns; (4th row) haute couture, KleinReid design, vintage wallpaper patterns and textures, art nouveau design, lines and patterns –like Louis Marjorelle, and botanical drawings.

In Progress—New Tile forms

24 April 2008

1 Comment

Though only two shown are complete, today I finished five new sized and shaped tile forms: three are larger rectangles, and two are a new arched form. (They currently measure 11″h x 7 1/2″w x 2″d in this leatherhard stage, but have some shrinking to do.) I continue to be very excited about these wall/mantel pieces. They are one of the most enjoyable forms I make.

The tiles are more than just canvases for pattern. The forms themselves are intriguing to me; soft with edges, like a torte. I enjoy how they poof out from the wall, or belly out on a tabletop. I particularly like them in groupings. Most are made in a series intended to work together, though they rarely stay together. The ones I finished today are intended to alternate between the two shapes. The palette has already been determined (even before the surfaces were complete), so that all five will be a different color.

I treat the surfaces more like collage than clay decoration. Each one has four to five layers that overlap and intermingle, including content. Three of the new tiles have animals (rabbits and bunnies, chubby birds, and owls), and text (“THICKLY SETTLED”*, “SQUEEZE RIGHT”* and “CRYSTALLIZE”). There is really too much going on with these for one post, so I will have to discuss my interest in words and text, and animals in another at some point.

By the way, three of the rectangle tile forms on the Wall/Mantel Pieces page are available and in need of a loving home: (Untitled) (ivory), SHY/Owl (lime) and CAKE (frost). Clerestory on the New Work page is also available. Drop me an email if you have questions and would like to purchase one. The vault form, HEAVY-DUTY and small square tiles are currently on exhibition and for sale at the “Made In Clay” show at Greenwich House Pottery in NYC through 4/30.

*These amusing phrases are from street signs that seem to be particular to Massachusetts (or New England) where I have lived since 2001. When I first saw a sign reading, “THICKLY SETTLED”, I thought it meant something about the pavement. It refers to areas that are densely populated, so you need to watch your speed. “SQUEEZE RIGHT” (or left) means “merge”. (I’ve used them here in my work to signify other meanings, however.)