Exhibitions

Sabbia Gallery is pleased to present this new body of work from Sydney ceramic artist, Simone Fraser.

The universal nature of the vessel form has been a lifelong area of investigation for me. My exploration involves looking from the macro of landscape to the minutiae of surface where form, texture, and beauty intertwine.

My work is both physical and sensual; the process of creation has my whole body engaged. I am at one with the work; the wet soft clay bending and flowing in my hands; expressionistic  marks from the impulse of my fingers. These random gestural markings allow texture to create form as well as identifying softness and malleability. The piercings create lightness, pushing through and deconstructing the “container” even further, enhancing the sculptural nature of the work. The layers of rugged slip and soft water colour application of the dry glaze further extend the sensual nature of the surface and unifies the many aspects of the work.

Beauty has been an important element in my work. However, I am not looking for any “golden mean” of beauty. The subjective nature of it comes from the fact that it is in the eye of the beholder, and it is a phenomenon that has changed throughout history and has helped form tradition and civilisation. It is more than what we can observe and what we are comfortable with. It needs to be tested. For example, imperfection yields new forms of beauty and this investigation is a constant in my work.
Therefore my role as an artist is not to define what beauty is but question what has been seen in the past, while also bringing new elements together and pushing into new ways of seeing beauty subjectively.

Simone Fraser, June 2014