Ceramic artist Tamsin van Essen uses a combination of novel and traditional techniques to produce thought-provoking pieces, including many drawn from science and medicine. For example, her Medical Heirlooms series comprised a series of vessels that seemed to have skin diseases, while the cups in her Contamination series appeared to have been colonized by various nasty bacteria.
I was particularly drawn to her Collection of Curious Objects, a series of less traditionally shaped objects inspired by theoretical physics. On her website, Van Essen explains:
Physicists are busy developing sophisticated theories around the existence of things that are impossible for us to see, perfecting mathematical models of the ‘beyond-visible’ worlds of the very large and distant (using Einstein’s theory of relativity) and the very small (using quantum mechanics).
Focusing on this realm of the intangible, I wanted to explore how abstract theoretical ideas can be visually represented. I also wanted to play with the notion that today’s cutting-edge theories may one day be seen as quaint and curious museum pieces: theoretical antiques or abstract junk.
The objects might be found in someone’s dusty attic or perhaps turn up on Antiques Roadshow in the future: “Oh my! Look what they thought in 2008!”
I love their simultaneous seriousness and playfulness – ceramic quarks and wormholes! – demonstrating van Essen’s willingness to engage with difficult and abstract ideas in an accessible but not dumbed-down way. And while I can admire the thought and craft that goes into a vase that appears to have syphilis, I’d much rather have a shiny quark.
If you’re in the UK, you can see some of van Essen’s work in the Subversive Design show at the Brighton Museum through March 2014.
The Finch and Pea 