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Saturday, January 13, 2001 By Mary Thomas, Post-Gazette Art Critic
It's a good month for fans of clay and for those who'd like to learn more about it. Three Shadyside exhibitions, each very different from the others and all worth seeing, show the versatility of the medium and of the artists currently working with it.
Mugs slouMangus, who is from the Mercer area and teaches at Kent State University, has been showing at Clay Place since the 1970s and has a large following who appreciate his ability to maintain a feeling of wet clay in motion in his functional works. ch, twist and move along on pegged feet. Lips of bowls dip in curves that seem unsustainable. Some pots are deeply carved, while others are decorated with a stable of symbols that reappear through the years or are simply loosely brushed with a dilute, colored clay in a vaguely Asian style. A speckled mug rests upon a Frisbee-like red saucer. A quite respectable vase carved with fish has a strange critter on one side. Mangus' inimitable look may seem born of irreverence, but it is more familiarity that informs his choices. There is a nonself-conscious comfort, and appreciation of process, that allows him to admire a piece as it shapes off center, that keeps him from trimming extra clay from a pot's foot. At times he's outrageously near the edge, but that may be the mug you want to spend time with each day. And when he's at his best, a viewer can ride the crest of those sensuous curves to sheer visual pleasure. (While at the gallery, check out his luster ware out front.) While Mangus is all about clay, sometimes it's hard to find in Hauber's work. The Pitt and CMU grad, who now teaches in Wisconsin, paints her clay sculptures with acrylics, draws on them, glues on patterned paper and adds found objects. Sometimes, as with "proof in the pudding" in which a rainbow that originates in a small black crib ends in tires dangling in front of tiny people encapsulated in epoxy, the clay disappears entirely. ("I am not a purist. My ideas come before any loyalty to materials.") But no matter, her colorful, compelling works are sophisticated and childlike and have an intimacy that draws the viewer near. Are they toys, or weapons? Curious, lobed shapes with plenty of charm and character, they are dynamic small sculptures that become monumental when one notices the teeny figures encased on the edge of a nub or a protrusion. The silver lumps of "mother and child: exhibit A" (B & C) look like rounded, budding yeast. Some of the pieces are inspired by Cartoon Network characters like the Powerpuff Girls or Web games, like the playful "sissyfighter" with a tough underside. Whether read as form, symbol or narrative, they have a presence and individuality that succeeds.
If Mangus captures the fluidity of the throwing process, the nine artists at the PCA retain the drama of the kiln firing. Birthed after a long and intense soaking in raging flame, these pots bear the marks of heat and fire, and their surfaces project a warm, deep glow that seems incongruous in a fixed object. Potters who wood fire are risk takers. There are easier and less expensive methods available that result in a far more predictable product. But the collaboration with the kiln is one of the qualities that appeals to these artists, who load it with weeks of work, tend its fire through the night for days, wait out a cool down period, and then enter with anticipation. The serendipitous is courted, and when everything comes together to produce a load of fantastically marked pots --or even a few-- the experience is exhilarating. Most of the glazing in this exhibition, which capably fills two galleries, is from natural ash, i.e. that which rises from the burning wood and is deposited as it rides air currents across the stacked ware. The result will vary with the type of wood used, the density of the stacking and the location in the kiln, which has numerous temperature zones. This is where the artist's experience enters. Depending upon how these combine, the ash may just buss the clay or be heavily deposited, be opaque or clear, glossy or dry, a range that may be seen in Tracey Donoughe's Pod series, a group of tall, undulating, somewhat figural forms. Sometimes the result is truly spectacular, as in Dale Huffman's large vase where a concentration of ash generated runs that look like liquid olivine pouring across the surface. Or the tall, lean vase in the corner of another gallery, by Donn Hedman, which stops a moment of change as fleeting as a sunset, and as lovely, for eternity. The influence of an Asian aesthetic is evident in this exhibition -- one thinks of the great historic Japanese kilns of Bizan and Shigaraki when looking at work by Huffman, who's spent potting time in Japan -- and the shino glaze, which is the other major surface treatment, has its origin in that tradition. Shino has multiple qualities, and firing conditions may produce a surface that is genially creamy, chalky white or blushed tangerine; it can trap carbon and gain a perpetual shadow or take on a luster. Each of these effects may be seen in the exhibition, most specially in pots by John Jacobson who has an especial affinity for shino, and who is one of the three major artists exhibiting, along with Huffman and Hedman. His two large vases have lively, colorful surfaces streaked with the red/blue rainbow of copper (the stronger being the one with the less predictable line) and given texture by thick applications of shino, which results in an irregular and desirable pitting.
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