Xavier Orssaud
Upright poles with sophisticated knobs, sponges dipped in slip, dishes made of glaze and river sand; everything Xavier Orssaud created at EKWC is artificial and at the same time close to nature. Organic growth but cultivated, translated into ceramics, arranged to evoke some sacred space – vertical poles in a circle tend to do that – bringing the viewer back in touch with a world that never existed. Breaking it down. The poles, inspired on wooden sticks used long ago for oyster cultivation in southern France, are part of Orssaud’s family history. The floral knobs with their mother-of-pearl glaze are cast from glass stoppers for decanters. The sponges come from the loofah plant, an organic alternative to artificial sponges and dishwashing brushes you can buy at the Arab stores in the Paris neighbourhood where Orssaud works. Somehow, knowing this makes the work so much more human, so much closer to life.
Alice Heron
Alice Héron (FR) is exploring the idea of Gut Feeling, observing how her cooking experiences nourish her ceramic practice and how her artistic practice intertwines. She is interested in the relationship between intuition and guts, what we eat and how we feel, digestion of feelings and food. Heron used an instant noodle package from the supermarket for deepening into glazing experiments, a symbol for how our emotions are sealed. A dark sci-fi digital iris luster emerged, evoking a little-scary, rather beautiful feeling, as when following intuition. Simultaneously, she 3D-scanned, re-scaled, and developed new Styrofoam press-in molds using CNC milling. A series of rhizomatic patterns grew bigger and expanded its gutty surfaces inside her studio. The iridescent reflections of the luster and the magnetic dark curves make our guts feel and growl.
