Forming Words artist: Wendy Hatfield-Witt

I enjoy telling personal stories through text and image. Images create a story which can be open to interpretation and enable the viewer to find their own connection. Long before the written word images created their own narrative telling stories of life. Motifs evolved from beliefs and patterns represented an era. The decorative objects that we choose are a pivotal part of an individual’s identity and personality. Text is too literal for me. I enjoy adding images and textures as this completes the story.

Wendy Hatfield-Witt Sea Bottles 2011

Wendy Hatfield-Witt Sea Oval Dishes 2011

Wendy Hatfield-Witt Sea Set 2011

Sea set: The image is a box brownie photograph of my great grandparents fishing on their honeymoon. (Port Campbell Victoria). The nautical maps are from personal journeys. The text is extracts from Captain Cook’s diary, entered as he travelled up the east coast of Australia.

Wendy Hatfield-Witt Icon Beakers (detail) 2011

Icon Beakers: The beakers celebrate femininity. The staircases represent the accumulation of knowledge over time. Doors open and close often shaping or changing life’s destiny. The text represents memories and recorded stories. All women are angels: icons in their own way.

Forming Words participating artist: Sarit Cohen

Simple forms - Simplicity
Complexity
Beauty
Delicate, fine, mysterious - Subtly
Life experience
Multilayered
Interwoven memories
Sharing
Peace
Appreciation

“Her personal journey through India, Turkey, Israel and Australia is a multilayered one. It is interwoven with numerous cultural and ethnic excursions each inhabited by the ongoing and integral impact of family and the joys of sharing, food, company and love, that should be part and parcel of every human’s existence. Through her ceramic practice, Cohen offers to her audience an invitation to share and an invitation to appreciate her own expressions of the beauties of life.”

Peter Haynes, Director ACT Museum & Galleries August 2010

Sarit Cohen Temples 2011 

Sarit Cohen Marriage Celebration 2011  

Sarit Cohen Salad Bowls 2011  

Sarit Cohen Cup and Vase 2011  

Forming Words participating artist: Ingrid Tufts

I like typography. I like the way that letters form shapes. I like the delicacy of fine script and the boldness of large headlines. I use text as a design device, the words and sentences forming pattern.  

However it goes beyond decoration... The text is often integral to the meaning of my work and it is often inspired from literary works, and quotes.  Sometimes the text informs the shape; sometimes a piece of text just seems to fit the form. It alway contributes to the piece in some way - even if not apparent immediately. The text can shout or it can gently enhance. It can cajole and amuse. I read anything, quite randomly, it's involuntary. I have come to read and enjoy texts by the most tenuous of connection... a snippet here, a quote there... so I like it when people ask where text on my pots is from.

Ingrid Tufts Saint Cyril 2011 

Ingrid Tufts Be Kind 2011 

Ingrid Tufts Alphabet Soup (detail) 2011  

Ingrid Tufts Remembrance 2011  

Forming Words participating artist: Jan Downes

I am particually interested in communication and some of the means of communication which are being replaced by new technologies.

Post

Letters and envelopes .

Sacred Scrolls

They explore the diversity of symbols which form some of the written scripts of languages around the world. I want to communicate an appreciation of the aesthetic qualities of the scripts and focus on the importance of their preservation, especially with globalisation of computer technology and the digitalisation of script. 

Jan Downes Lost In Translation 2011 

 Jan Downes Sent By Post 2011 

Jan Downes Sacred Scrolls(detail) 2011 

Forming Words participating artist: Jane Walton

My work represents a period in time that echoes in the writings and markings of cultural influences. Whether it is an impression in clay from an ancient culture or a hand-written letter from the 19^th century, markings and text conjure up memories and thoughts of other times.

Hand written text has the spirit of an individual. That moment of recognition triggers memories of the person and past experiences, we feel as if we can see and hear them as we read their writing.

Markings from ancient cultures record historical events in many different languages on ceramics, parchment, paper and other mediums. It can be ornate and functional recording invaluable knowledge of humanities cultural evolution.

Even though my work incorporates text and impressions it is only a trigger for the viewer into a place and time, remembered or imagined. 

Jane Walton Letter 2010 

Jane Walton Detective 2010 

Jane Walton Old England 2011

Jane Walton Vogue Pattern 2011

All good things must come to an end...

Tomorrow is the last day of Forming Words. This wonderful exhibition is well worth visiting. The intricacies and subtleties within the work are way too difficult to represent digitally!

But I will try. In the following weeks I will be doing a post on each artists work, to give those unable to attend in person the chance to experience, to some degree, the beautiful work on display.

Forming Words

panGALLERY's current exhibition explores a popular trend in contemporary Australian ceramics that sees the inclusion of text on ceramic forms.

Eight Australian ceramicists exhibit works that explore how the written word can further our appreciation of a three dimensional artwork, merging text and form to convey a cohesive idea.

Here are some words that describe the response on opening night - peering, pondering, peeking... considering, conversing, carousing... analysing, appreciating and applauding. 

Curators Ingrid Tufts and Emidio Puglielli have done a beautiful job of highlighting the intricacies, themes and substance in this movement.

And the artists work... well more on that shortly...

Forming Words

4 to 25 March

Exhibiting artists: Jane Walton, Connie Lichti, Kylie Johnson, Mel Robson, Jan Downes, Ingrid Tufts, Wendy Hatfield-Witt and Sarit Cohen