Night Skies: Antares 6 is another fantasy piece like Jupiter Rising and Child’s Garden on Gilese 832: Blue Floxnia all of which stand for the idea that while I maybe too old to physically visit the universe – I can still get there in my imagination. Join me. Raku fired ceramic Wall hanging 6″ x 14″
Scientists believe they have discovered a possibly habitable planet orbiting the star Gilese 832 only 16 light years from Earth. Child’s Garden on Gilese 832X: Blue Floxnia is a fantasy trip across those 16 years to gaze upon the life forms that might be there. A sculpture composed of stained glass and ceramics fired together this is the first of a series of pieces intended to explore this concept through a combination of different colors and shapes.
I am pleased to announce that my ceramic mosaic piece Creation Story has been accepted into the Mosaic Society of Philadelphia Members Exhibition at Gratz College. The show will open June 26th and run through August 27th.
Usually I have at least a rough idea of what a piece will look like and be called before I start it. However, when I’m working with abstract multiple tile pieces, particularly raku fired ones, the finished piece is more likely to dictate both the form and the title. I started Behold a Pale Horse by firing 70 2″ x 2″ tiles using a combination of underglazes, glazes and a spattering of raku glazes, and then arranging the fired tiles into various configurations until i got one that “spoke ” to me. Behold a Pale Horse is called what it is because the image I see is that of a pale horse. My image may not be as sharply defined as in Revelations 6:8, but to me it is there. 63 tiles, 13″ x 16 1/2″.
Spatial Geometry is an assemblage of 18 hand-made and raku-fired triangular tiles which employs a variety of glazes,unglazed surfaces and both oxidation and reduction to create geometric patterns. Intended as a wall hanging, it is approximately 12.5″ x 12.5″.
Moses Warms His Hands, a mixed media sculpture, is the third piece of the WHOLLY MOSES! set. Consisting of hand-built, raku-fired ceramics and a polychromatic deadwood pruning. It was inspired by Exodus 3:3, the time in the narrative when Moses is investigating the burning bush but before the Lord has spoken to him.
Moses Brings Down The Law is a hand-built, raku-fired sculpture which is the second piece in the WHOLLY MOSES! set. Inspired by Exodus 19:25, 20:1-17. 6.5” x 3” x 5”
Moses Parts the Sea: Epilogue is a mixed media sculpture which takes its inspiration from Exodus 14:21-29. Consisting of hand-built, raku-fired ceramics, plastic, and wood, it is one of three pieces in the lighthearted and perhaps slightly irreverent WHOLLY MOSES! set. 6” x 6” x 9”
The inspiration for The Last Druid was the 1774 painting The Bard by Thomas Jones, which is in Amgueddfa Cymru (National Museum of Wales) but which I was fortunate to see while it was on exhibition at the Frick Art and Historical Center in Pittsburgh. The Welsh believed the Bards to be descendants of the Celtic druids. As in The Bard, I have posed a solitary figure at the edge of a jagged cliff. My depiction in The Last Druid is cloaked in a mantle of greenery, tying him to his natural world. Hand built unglazed ceramic, set on gneiss. No adhesive is used.
10” x 6” x 10”
John Fansmith 