I have been playing around with random porcelain slab forms, creating shapes that please me but are in no way meant to be representational. I had in my mind the desire to see how much the brain makes up an incomplete picture in order to make sense of what the eye sees. I threw some small ‘nipple’ shapes on the wheel and then attached them in a crude way to my porcelain slab forms. What appeared to me was an instant torso, with a questionable gender because the nipples are so erect and defined, whereas the female breast is absent.
Nonetheless, I was reminded yet again about the subjectivity of art – a fellow ceramicist (won’t mention any names…) asked me as I was attaching the clay nipples to the forms, whether they were panic buttons or sun hats. I am not kidding – he really did not see what I saw. So much for the brain making up its own story….What do you see??
Art and Beyond 