在1800年的时候，特伦特河畔斯托克的六个小镇与中国并驾齐驱成为世界陶瓷产品的中心。尽管在最近几十年，数世纪与陶瓷相关的专业知识都被重置在远东地区，导致本土劳动力的过度消耗以及在历史上一度盛行的生产基地的消失。这种世界范围内的技术传输使我开始关注英国陶瓷工业的古老源头，讽刺得是，它的规模之大是因为陶瓷工业者受东方人品味的影响向陶器器皿市场转移资本。借助十八世纪早期的中国艺术造型，我创作了相似风格和造型复制品，以此使中国的典型造型以较简单的方式表现出来。我运用了它们的陪葬功能来表现社会和经济上的遗赠关系，这种世界资本化的循环在已有传统的基础上产生了。
我的其他作品关注的是富平陶艺村工厂里的工作场景。生产线上的陶泥沙砾表现出机械工作的匆忙，抑或被丢弃行为扭曲的高水平手工技艺被挽救回来并烧制成型，这些都使日常生活中规律化的固有行为变成永恒。秩序井然却又充满随意的建筑材料堆堆放得恰到好处却又似刻意的去重放，在注视大批量产品时，如果移动产品位置，重新摆放就会获得另一种美。
By 1800 the six towns of Stoke-on-Trent paralleled China as a world centre for ceramic production. Though, recent decades have seen centuries of its associated expertise being relocated to the Far East, resulting in a massive depletion of an indigenous work force and the closure/demolition of once prevalent sites of historic manufacture. This global transfer of skill has focused my attention to the early origins of the British ceramic industry, whose expanse ironically was due to potters capitalizing upon capturing the market for wares inspired by Oriental taste. Borrowing directly from these early 18th century forms of Chinoiserie, I conduct a similar pattern of stylistic plagiarism, whereby Chinese archetypes are rendered through lesser sophisticated means. Their funereal function is also drawn upon to signify the social and economic demise that these cycles of global capitalism incur upon established traditions.
Other works explore a continual fascination for labour systems observed within the FPAV factory. Clay detritus from the production line that displays the haste of repetition, or high craftsmanship distorted by the act of discarding is salvaged and fired, making the implicit actions of daily routine permanent. Orderly and random stacks of architectural furnishings are directly appropriated and painstakingly reconstructed, to reframe the incidental beauty of displaced function within the overwhelming gaze of mass production. |
