Sculpture | DaumaCeramics

UPwithArt Silent Auction and Fundraiser 2023

Museum London, ON

Sunny-side Up!

Porcelain, glaze, underglaze, wood, wire

UpwithArt is an annual event held in London, ON. Proceeds support the Unity Project for Relief of Homelessness, which provides housing-focused emergency shelter, supportive housing, and in-home housing stability services. If you'd like to learn more about this important cause - and help support it - please click here.

Show & Tell 2023

Benz Gallery, London, ON

Show & Tell continues the introspective journey begun in Familiar Ways, exploring memory, anxiety, and the blurred lines between past and present. Drawing from personal moments, both painful and playful - this body of work invites viewers into a space where vulnerability meets absurdity. Clay remains my primary tool for storytelling, its tactile nature allowing me to shape emotion into form. For this exhibition, I introduced an edible element - a giant prescription bottle filled with pill-shaped cookies, a gesture that plays with themes of coping, consumption, and comfort. Show & Tell is part confession, part offering - an open drawer of the things we keep hidden and the ways we try to make sense of them.

Familiar Ways 2023

Canadian Clay and Glass Gallery, Waterloo

How does our past influence our present? What moments do you hold near and dear, and what moments haunt you? Each of our individual realities are created by a series of unique circumstances that influence how we relate and respond to one another. Those who loved us shaped our world as much as those who hurt us.

There has always been a lot of uneasiness in my world, a lot of anxiety and fear. I’ve struggled for many years not knowing there is a different reality out there, that things don’t have to be so dreadful. Sometimes we just need a little help. If your anxieties were to take a physical shape - what would they look like? A giant spider? A swarm of ants? Or maybe..a pile of buttons?

Familiar Ways aims to explore my reality, my unique situation, my perception of everyday things, and the memories I carry. Lost between the past, present, and future, I stumble to make sense of things and heal.

The exhibition represents various moments in time that were remarkable to me but maybe didn't mean anything at all to a passerby. It’s a collection of reflections and reactions to mundane things, extraordinary things and everything in between.

In the last couple of years, I’ve been attempting to reconnect and hold on to the sense of childlike playfulness and curiosity. The tactile quality of clay enables me to explore these themes and to better understand myself, as well as the world around me. The work I create, and the act of making in and of itself, serve as a form of escapism.

In the end, does our dear protagonist climb out of the bottom of the well for long? Is this point of view a little skewed? A little twisted? What is the opposite of rose-colored glasses? Tune in to find out that these questions (and more!) will not be answered.

Creatures Of Habit 2022

Wall Space Gallery, Ottawa

Have you ever wanted to be a fly on a wall? Perhaps you’ve experienced being snug as a bug? Maybe you're a social butterfly, or you’ve got ants in your pants, but I just think you’re the bee's knees!

Insects have long fascinated me, they perform various rituals, have relationships, complex societal structures, and specific ways to communicate. I feel a strange kinship with ants, in particular, I relate to their busyness and sense of urgency. We’re not all that different, us - the people and them - the tiny life forms that surround us. We often feel superior, yet we’re all just creatures of habit. The show explores these parallels, through a series of figurative and abstract forms, and references to self, while using nature as a metaphor for the human condition.

Some Place Else 2022

Welcome to the world of giant berries, angry bugs, skinned knees, close encounters, and swamp monster divers. A world where the past, present, and future are all happening simultaneously. Does your brain ever feel like a scrambled egg? Perhaps you’d like to meet a duck named Louis? If you catch yourself whispering yes, it’s time to pack your bags - Some Place Else is waiting. There are no rules here, but you should still probably leave your shoes by the trapdoor.

Some Place Else was on view for a three month feature at the Gardiner Museum in the early 2022. This was my first introduction to figurative forms and storytelling elements. Many details, including titles, reference my childhood. I used old photographs as starting points for clothing and color choices. This was a deeply personal body of work, which was very exciting and challenging to build.

Installation

Significant Other 2020

Porcelain, glazes, gold luster

12” H x 11” W x 10” D

Significant Other explores a curiously dark ritual that's very often observed in nature - when one of the mates kills and eats the other. Most notably, this happens with praying mantis pairs, but it's also common between several other insect and arachnid orders.

Shimmy 2020

Porcelain, glazes, gold luster

11” H x 6” W

ceramic sculpture, pink flower top with many petals, green body, standing on three legs

Offspring 2020

Porcelain, glazes, gold luster

7” H x 6” W x 8” D

Did you know, it is extremely common for mothers to eat their young? Rabbits, cats, primates, and even the common hamster will devour their offspring, in most cases because they are weak or sick. This gives the mother nutrients to raise healthy babies or to get pregnant again. Shockingly, in recent years due to climate change, polar bears have been observed to eat their cubs, when their regular source of food (seal) is in short supply.

Departed 2020

Porcelain, glazes, gold luster, twine

7” H x 6” W x 8” D

Mother Knows Best 2020

Porcelain, glazes, gold luster, mother of pearl luster

𝘔𝘰𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘳 𝘒𝘯𝘰𝘸𝘴 𝘉𝘦𝘴𝘵 explores the relationship between a mother and her offspring, often a complicated balance of love, guilt, and resentment. The two figures are anxiously reaching out to each other, conveying a sense of trust. Yet there's a dark undertone, suggesting something more sinister might be afoot.

The phrase 'mother knows best' references the well-known story of Norman Bates, while the visual of two figures reaching out to each other pays an homage to E.T.