Published in Neue Keramik, 6, 2023
The works of English ceramic artist Ken Eastman (b. 1960) that are being exhibited this autumn at Galerie Marianne Heller in Heidelberg give us cause for closer study.
Work by this ceramist - trained in Edinburgh and at the Royal College of Arts - has been exhibited worldwide, both in Europe and Asia, has been honoured with major prizes and is held in many museums.
Constructed from geometric shapes in rather more architectural style, his work from the 1990s have gained an increasingly sculptural quality. Abstract vessels have developed into enigmatic structures consisting of open and closed forms that reveal their affinity with architecture even today. The additively assembled stoneware slabs have painted, coloured surfaces. The mysterious element emerges because it seems that opposed forces are at work in Eastman’s pieces - perfection that has strangely diverged slightly from a sense of order. They seem consciously constructed. Yet at the same time, some components suggest they have uncontrolledly taken on a life of their own.
The geometric, angular pieces are in opposition to organically modulated ones. Transverse forms interrupt a continuous flow of line. Some segments rest blocky and static, closing themselves off hermetically, others form soft curves that look like fabric blown in the wind. The parts interlock. This dynamic topography creates shadows of varying depths and opens up space. In this process, the way Eastman works is revealing. He places the individual clay slabs over everyday “found objects” such as an old shoe, boots, a plastic bottle or a drink- ing cup. They form a shape created somewhat randomly as a starting point for the further construction process. Eastman compares this method to working on an objet trouvé.
The frequently monochrome painting consisting of numerous layers of colour in matt, muted tones has an important function. The coloured engobes are applied in several layers and require multiple firings to achieve the desired effect. They serve to distinctly separate or connect the individual parts from one another. The pig- ment, which often appears powdery, creates a fresco- like appearance that dematerializes the stoneware. The colour becomes one with the shard and penetrates it. It immerses the objects in a meditative, dream-like atmos- phere marked by the traces of time.
In his work, the artist always explores the same theme: a fragmented, hollow spatial body made up of parts. Eastman, who lives in the countryside in the north- west of England near the Welsh border, combines in his sculptural vessels urban elements like an architectural principle with natural, rural elements such as the earthy, weathered, dull tones in the colouring. Over the years, the vessel motif has changed in shape and character. It is continually undergoing the most surprising metamor- phoses. For a certain creative period, Eastman speaks of “dissonant almost collapsing pots”. The latest pieces are quieter and more restrained. They are poetic structures made of light and shade. If you look at the development of his œuvre up to today, it is reminiscent of the natural movement of life with its internal and external changes, changing thoughts and feelings, growth and erosion in nature.
The vessels are created in a long process, often over several months, at the end of which there is a concentration, a carefully worked-out distillation of possibilities. Nevertheless, the assembled forms with their visible seams and irregular, almost provisional-looking upper edges give the impression that they could be changed and expanded at any time.
Eastman recalls that on a trip to Cairo, the haphazard additions and superstructures of the homes caught his attention. It is precisely these randomly created stacks of boxes and uncontrolled proportions without a hierarchy of parts, ultimately resulting in a harmonious, living organism that he also what he wants for his work. “I want- ed to get a kind of rambling, patched together difficulty into the work - as if no one would ever intend something to be that way, but when you saw it, it was somehow right.” This endeavour shapes Eastman’s work. At the same time, it is reminiscent of the buildings of Frank Gehry, who breaks up rectangular form and also takes a deconstructivist approach.
The titles that the artist chooses for his works (such as “Far from me” or “You thought you knew”) are not metaphors or concrete guides to understanding. He says, “The pots here have no subject, they are not about anything in particular and they have no practical function; they are made purely for looking at, for joy.”
Dr Nora Von Achenbach
is former head of the East Asian and Islamic Collection at the Hamburg Museum of Arts and Crafts.