Olga D - Final Presentation_Art Statement and Next Project

Power Point presentation, My Art and Plans

Olga Doutkevitch_Art Statement and Next Project

I think about my ceramic art as sculpture that is also a 3-dimensional canvas for my paintings.

I love to have powerful colors in my work: bright with high contrasts, or subtle colors of natural clays and natural looking textures. I think all this is well suited to the nature of ceramic.

A particular quality of ceramic is its texture. Just as I see color and form with my eyes, I feel and "see" the surface through the touch of the fingers. So of course, the tactile quality of ceramic is very important. I enjoy making most interesting textures of the surfaces that people will touch and hold with their own hands – because normally ceramic objects are durable enough to be used and be interactive. In this regard the medium of Terra Sigillata lets me create both colors and beautiful surfaces. It is a new medium for me, and I'm excited to research and work in a technique of Terra Sigillata right now.

My Next Project.

For my next big project -- my BFA show-- I would like to do the combination of 2-dimensional majolica painting and three-dimensional sculpture and relief.

 I just realized that I do it already, only in separate works, but I think they they're very much in harmony with each other, so I can put them together in one installation. My project is inspired by the book that I read recently by Noah Gordon, The Physician. I won’t be making an exact illustration of that book, but it'll rather be really inspired by the idea in that book: about people who have a real dream, and are brave and strong enough to go across half the world to make this Dream happen.

The two-dimensional part of that composition is inspired by the style of Medieval architecture and illustrations in illuminated books. The way that they have the Narrative in the illustrations and architecture details together as parts of the whole composition.  A three-dimensional relief work combining Painting, high and low relief, all becoming a fully 3 dimensional objects.

I don't know exactly how it will work, I need to figure it out, but so far, I see that I already do 3-dimensional sculptural objects, and this kind of medieval inspired paintings and drawings. I realized that in my works they have so much in common that they can become somehow together.

The size of my works is often small. I think I always liked to work in that size, delicate and carefully crafted. 

This kind of tiny ceramic vessel might benefit from being a part of something larger, like sculpture objects:

 I'm already making practically modular structures which can become tower-like objects to become a display, or kind of a little homes or even a little world for my smaller works in my BFA show.