More Than Real: Victor Spinski

Giving Up On Painting, 1999

I have seen sculpture imitating life to the maximum degree a couple of times lately. At MOMA in Manhattan last month, I saw an awesome, but disturbing show by Robert Gober. In his room sized installations, what looked liked real objects e.g. bags of cat litter, a bag of donuts, were actually sculptures.*

Spinski glazing a trash can sculpture

And here is Victor Spinski in a retrospective at The Clay Center, playing with words and duplicating the textures, colors, forms of reality with total accuracy - in clay.



The tubes of paint are in the trash can. Well, of course, it's acrylic. I gave up on that media, too.

A different kind of paint here. What might have been being painted with these paints in black, blue and pink?

Spinski has used luster glazes to make these cans shiny and metallic looking.

Carving A Teapot Out of a Rock, 2008

These last two have something in common. Both are made of rock, supposedly, if you take the titles seriously. They have metal components - the mallet, and the tool and hardware portions. They are quite convincing in their imitation of the materials, I think, in particular the marble teapots.

Marble Teapots, 2004

What compels humans/artists to create these illusions? Is it the challenge of the task or is it the whimsical quality, the intellectual playfulness of creating a different reality from raw materials? Because after all, what does Spinski start with? Like God in the story of Genesis, he makes a world out of a lump of clay.

*A "bag of donuts" in the center of one of Robert Gober's installations -
the walls are covered with drawings of male and female genitalia.

Back to Philadelphia

After spending the night at a friend's condominium on Rittenhouse Square, I set off Saturday morning for two of my favorite places in Philly.








Walking past the stone dog in the square, and down many blocks I arrived at the first favorite place: Reading Terminal Market. So much to choose from, I opted for Smucker's for an egg sandwich and Beiler's for some of their incredible donuts to bring home.


Then on to the second place: The Clay Studio. The light rain was not making for good photographs, but on the way I passed some famous landmarks.

Constitution Hall

Christ Church

They match don't they? Not much difference between architecture for church and state in old Philadelphia.










At The Clay Studio, there were two exhibits: one called Gifted; Contemporary Pottery, Tile and Small Sculpture, and the other a retrospective of Victor Spinski.

I decided to photograph pieces in the Gifted show that looked hand built, just to document what people are doing in that realm today. Here is Joanna Pike's shelf, very obviously hand built with finger marks showing and uneven lips on the vessels. The cups weighed very little, but the tray and other pieces were very heavy.

Joanne pike

Matthew Ziemke

Finger marks are also very obvious on Matthew Ziemke's pieces which are thin walled. He favors punching holes in all kinds of places, not just functional holes. Also random lines across blank white surfaces is a feature of this work.

Andrew Gillimet

Although these appear slip cast and not hand built, I really liked these mugs by Andrew Gillimet. The forms and decals work well together.

Sunshine Cobb

Sunshine Cobb's pieces are always slapdash, but confident looking, and I like them very much.

A. Blair Clemons

These white and gold glazed (looks like the Amoco gold I've been using) are rather baroque made by the gender-less A. Blair Clemons.

Not in the Gifted show, but in a little select exhibit called Breakfast, I found my favorite work. Lisa Orr's exuberantly glazed ware. I'm not sure what this one is for though. It seems too big for a napkin holder. Is it a sculpture?

plates by Lisa Orr

Her work has little attachments all over making them look crusty, like they've been accumulating barnacles underwater. The glazes are earthy and lush, with occasionally some glittery gold phosphorescent passages.

I bought a cup.

It didn't cost much, and it will help me remember this artist from Austin, Texas, whose work I first encountered here at The Clay Studio in Philadelphia. It traveled by train with me back to New Jersey where it joined other cups and objects in my growing collection of minor masterpieces. It's found a home.

30th Street train station in the rain