Since 1993, the Sculpture Objects Functional Art and Design Fair (SOFA) has been highlighting three-dimensional art crossing the boundaries of fine art, decorative art, and design. SOFA is held at the Navy Pier in Chicago, and averages around 80 dealers and 35,000 attendees per show. This year, SOFA will run from October 31st to November 3rd.
Week 9: went to SOFA Chicago today. It’s an amazing feeling to be this overwhelmed by art. I even got to meet one of my favorite artist Ashley Buchanan! Definitely feeling inspired and excited to be making!
For ceramic artist Robert Cooper, recycling is a way of work. He employs found materials such as shards of broken pottery alongside leftover clays, oxides and glazes from teaching sessions to create his vessels and assemblages. Following his exhibition at London Arts Board, Traction Magazine meets the artist to find out more.
What first drew you to the medium of ceramics?
My dad was a cook in the army so it was pastry I used first and then plasticine and then clay dug from the garden by my father, a keen make-do-and-mend person. I spent time in hospital when young so had time to dream and draw making things followed trying to put into action my thoughts.
Tell me about your show with London Arts Board. This is a rather unusual space to show your work in - how did you approach this?
Liberty [Rowley, director of London Arts Board] came to our open studios, saw, talked and got an image of worked based around my extensive collection of shards collected from the Thames fore shore and recycled into candlesticks. In our headlong pelt into modernity its good to pause and light a candle for our past. We chose the image of a family of candle sticks, personally from my experience of public commissions I have done (London underground station identities, Leicester Square, Euston Station on the Northern Line). I find having lots to look at helps when one is passing back and forth.
The Surface Decorated Vessels are work using cardboard packaging where I paint and silk screen with slips directly on to the surface and pick off the work with sloppy wet clay and manipulate the card and clay while plastic and the result can give a Pompeian fresco feel though contemporary.
Much of your work employs found objects and recycled materials. What is your favourite foraging spot?
I find my material on the fore shore of the Thames and out in Kent on the estuary where the Victorians dumped their household waste. Cannon Street Station has a entry to the shore but it is dangerous when the tide turns and I have gone to teach with wet feet when I was too engrossed in the finding of things. It is still possible to find Roman, Chinese export ware and medieval bits but it is proving to be a popular past time.
Your 'Cast Toys' series is particularly intriguing to me. Can you talk me through the process?
Our eldest grandchild would get stuffed toys but they did not last long. I would find their clones in charity shops and buy to keep their memories.I want to tell stories so I find a toy and remove the insides, though not hooking out the brains out through the nose as in Egyptian mummification. I put back a wire skeleton and dry clay filling with dry glaze material sewed it up and dip into casting clay. I created a open vessel for a show at the Metre Square Gallery based around the seven levels of hell (check the internet for details). Glazing and transfers on glaze enamels follow if needed, and lustres.
What does 2015 have in store for you?
I have completed a successful workshop at Officine Saffi Gallery, Milan, Italy and two shows at the Contemporary Applied Arts London, one showing the candlesticks and the other a collaboration "dish of the day" with Stella Harding - a maker - using basketry processes. It was shown at the National Trust House Uppark in West Sussex - see Stella Harding’s website and blog for background research. In April I will be showing work with Ceramic Art London at the Royal College of Art and in autumn of 2015 with Officine Saffi at SOFA Chicago.
Robert Cooper showed work with London Arts Board from 10 February to 10 March. Visit http://londonartsboard.blogspot.co.uk for more information. To find out more about Robert Cooper’s work, visit http://robertcooper.net.
