Artist Talk about his work and its process

The spirit of the ceramic medium

Ceramic is the oldest medium of art for centuries. You can use your all senses for this medium. You can shape it, control it, and fire it and it will become permanent. Each piece has its own experience and memory. Every piece has its own identity and this natural medium has its spiritual and ritualistic value.

In the bachelor's degree program, I have used natural medium for creating work, I am highly inspired by the natural forms which have some ritualistic beliefs as they are related to some spiritual theories. I like to play with material & expand the limitation of material. And I enjoy that creative process.

Working with clay connects me with nature, it reminds me of my childhood time, when I used to make small structures with local clay. It is about the visual, tangible experience by fingers, eyes, and brain. First, you touch the material, see it and feel it. 

The imitation of form comes from memories and past experiences. When I started working with clay it began with the memorial form which already existed in mind. Like tree skin, corals, and some abstract pre-existing form of nature. Specially corals have amazing curved form and texture. Sometimes forms also come by surrounding experience and memory like the process of decay which shows the reality of existence and non-existence.

In my work, I have tried to re-live that memory and try to give life in the form of clay. Every time it is not necessary to give control to the form what you expected. I am talking about my personal experience when you start giving the form to your imagination or memory,  at one point your idea or your memorial form and the form made have a fine-tuning when the form speaks for itself, and that is when you need not control over that form because that form tells its own story which relates to your mind and that form shall exist beyond your experience. Now it’s not completely related to your memory but of course, it comes from your memory. That form may exist beyond the memory and that opens the new path for the creative experience. 

In my bachelor’s degree program, I used natural mediums like paper Mache, natural fibers, flower colors for the making art-form. That time I came across the terracotta medium. At that time my major focus lied on the concept of pure form. The form has that own identity and its spirit. For a natural medium like paper Mache, I used it in a very controlled manner, feeling the limitation of dimension, you can’t go through very heavy textured when the form is a very controlled medium. But when I work with clay, I feel the playfulness of the material. 

I see clay on the wheel, little touch changes its identity of the form. That time I realized that little touch, little incident, and that spontaneous act explodes into various possibilities. It feels as if the material speaks to you, “hey creator don’t worry about your creativity or imagination, I shall also add my fun to your creativity.” 

It makes me feel as if this material suggests to me about my practice and possibilities with the experiments. After that, I realized this natural medium also depends on the techniques. And also have a wide range of exploration. Like clay bodies terracotta, stoneware, porcelain and also glazes like ash glaze, crystalline glaze and many more. Then I work with stoneware in my master’s degree program.

I chose the ceramic medium to explore the idea of the creative process & unique techniques. I enjoyed the process of making. I want to focus only on the texture, and think about how to handle it, and try to push the boundaries of the medium.

First mature work is “water species”, I observe the abstract quality of corals and natural forms, the way it gets shaped by the natural atmosphere and develops its abstract quality. I try to recreate that abstract quality in works by the creative process by trying to handle the material unconventionally because the texture and surface quality needs it.

After doing this work, I am more interested in handling the raw quality of clay. I am trying to create a raw surface with a rough texture. I want to develop this work and create one more process-based work and that is “Buried City”.

This work starts with a drawing of random organic shapes and makes patterns and texture. The idea becomes more specific when the process happens from the drawing to material, the drawing is a random idea about the shape but the material gives the quality of rough texture like a cracked surface, it looks like the dried land. And in the end, it gives the effect of some destroyed ancient city, I accept that quality and develop my work further.

In the first work I used a very shiny Glaze because it needs some decorative look but here I want to show a ruined effect so used semi-opaque and gloss glaze. From the visual and the subject I slowly get knowledge of how used the glaze effects. 

Now the element of the cityscape comes into the work and I am also interested in maintaining the raw quality of the material. “Buried City” gives me a new direction about the subject. Now I want to work with a basic subject. After this work, I created the work “Burning City”.

The subject of work comes from my memory and treatment of the material. I’m trying here to show how natural quality becomes the metaphor of the subject. Used real burning clay for the work and that effect naturally gives a burning element in work. Here again, I used raw treatment and now I am more interested in expanding the dimension of the work. The burning effects of clay surprise me by making me more interested in creating the destroyed buildings of the city. 

The creation of a new city depends on the demolition and reconstruction of the city. the curve in the work depicts transformation to the destroyed city. This gives birth to my new work “Curved City”. I am doing this work in series. 

After the Curved city series, the city map or cityscape becomes the subject for my work.

Here, after talking about my work process and how previous work becomes an inspiration for the next one. All works are made in one particular way and I think that it creates a chain relating to understanding the work process and the possibilities of the idea, subject and material.

Baroda diaries (16 inch diameter each)

In the time of lockdown (2020), I am working continuing in the city-scape series at home and explore my ideas in ceramic material.