Master of Fine Arts Thesis Solarium Justin Donofrio - AURA

Master of Fine Arts Thesis

Solarium

Justin Donofrio

Submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirement for the degree of Master of Fine Arts, School of Art and Design

Division of Ceramic Art

New York State College of Ceramics at Alfred University Alfred, New York

2021

Justin Donofrio, MFA

Thesis Advisors: John Gill, Johnathan Hopp, Matt Kelleher, Walter McConnell, Meghan Smythe, and Adero Willard

Abstract:

The original purpose of a ‘Solarium’ (or sunroom) is to gather as much light as possible, allowing for an outdoor feel within an interior space. The exhibition revolves around the radiant contrasts of light and shadow at dawn and dusk, when the sun is low in the sky. There is a desire to capture and pay homage to the visual reverberations and transitions in lines and shapes. The luminous morning light reveals shapes and forms across the landscape interacting in overlapping layers.

The colors are built into the structure of the environment. As a rock climber and clay worker I build relationships of material qualities in the vessels, structures, forms, and rock climbing. Tension, balance, and compression mirror mental and physical strain reflected in the body of the climber or in the material qualities present in the vessels, structures and relationships I construct. There is a visual and physical weight of the different states of clay, raw to high fired and everywhere in between and I pay attention and use all with awareness. These concepts are all connected through a form of ideological material inquisition and pursuit of ephemerality within the fading life of wet clay. Within this, I’m looking for compositions to explore volume and implied volume to construct a kinesthetic visual experience. This concept is harkening back to a physical response to the continuum between clay and ceramic, climber and rock.

Enter: (The Front Door Studio/Mind Space)

I’m fascinated by the way light manipulates form. The radiance of contrast, created during both dawn and dusk when the sun is low in the sky, shape and resurface in my ceramic practice. These, for me, are some of the most tranquil, and meditative hours, of each new and passing day. My work arises in these moments between light and dark, dawn and dusk, night and day. There is a desire to capture and reflect on these visual reverberations and transitions in lines and shapes which interact in overlapping layers.

I walk into the studio as the sun is setting. Making sure to stop, I take a deep breath and fill my senses. I work through the night to maintain a connection to the vision. I walk home as the sun is coming up and meditate on the studio session. I am alone taking in a waking world. Clay is the medium I choose to articulate my relationship with light, shadow, landscape and these moments of transition and contemplation.

Solarium, Fosdick Nelson Gallery, Alfred University, 2021.

Minute Movements: (Internal/External)

Tension, balance, and compression mirror mental and physical strain reflective of my experiences as climber and clay worker. I build relationships of material qualities in the vessels, structures, forms, and through climbing. There is a physical dexterity built in the haptic sensibilities and immediacy of feedback in both climbing and clay, as information is sent from the fingertip to the brain. There is a profound connection to the state of the body and the way we think.¹ The work and process reflect how I feel when climbing. The endorphins release with emotional and physical struggle and are in search of capturing a moment.

I’m inspired by the line in the landscape, constants and the variables in climbing and clay. I’ve versed my muscle memory in practiced movements, which become the visual language of handling the material. Is there a fundamental tension between known fixed solutions and unknown and uncertain terrain of both practices?

1 Bohm, David. Thought as a System. Routledge, 2015, 9.

Seurat, Bouldering Mt. Evans, CO. Image-David C.

Pierce.

Search for the Summit: (What Goes Up Must Come Down)

In rock climbing and clay working there are lines or sequences from beginning to end. In each process, these pathways are circular, in that once you reach the summit there really is only one place to go. Ascend, to sink back, and ascend again. It is the processes in the middle that keeps me coming back. John Gill, the preeminent rock climber (not the ceramic the artist), says “In bouldering, you’re concerned as much--if not more--with form, style, elegance, and route difficulty as you are with getting to the top.”² The summit is only as rewarding as the work put in to reach it.

There are many ways to reach for the summit of a rock face. Aid gear (usually metal manmade objects) can be placed temporarily or permanently fixed to the rock’s surface. For example, a piton is a steel sharp implement similar in shape to a railroad spike which is hammered into an existing crack in the rock. Sport climbing routes are bolted with a drill in order for carabiners to be used for safety and

assistance in holding the climber. In Traditional or Trad-climbing the camelots,

2Ament, Pat. John Gill: Master of Rock: the Life of a Bouldering Legend. Sheffield: Vertebrate Publishing, 2018.

Rusty Bolt, Permanent Rock-Climbing Aid Gear Placed in Rock.

hexes, or nuts come in all different sizes and are placed into existing rock features of similar shape. These are removed completely once the climb is finished.

Alternatively, soloing or bouldering is climbing with just shoes and fingertips.

I do say I’m a minimalist at heart, just me clinging to razor sharp edges; with only the lichen covered swaths of granite to keep me company. There’s no rope to get in my way or fumbling with aid gear. The focus is on the material at hand. Just me and the climbing, or me and clay making. The solitude of these experiences parallel each other equally in immensity. There’s a unique calibration of minute movements between internal and external elements. Listening, as call and response, to natural forces, happens both in the making process, and the wilderness.

All the variable elements that can assist or impede, obscure, or reveal in both climbing and clay. These ways of reaching for the summit are visible in the work. The conversation between the stained bare clay and glaze obscures or reveals a bodily response to a continuum between clay and ceramic, clothes and skin, gear or no gear. The springs,

slings, or ceramic noodles act as a transfer of this energy and movement much like the camelot, quick draw, or crash pad in the climbing discipline. The overhang is the keystone to the visual complexity.

On Repetition (detail), Stoneware and Porcelain, Terra Sigillata, 2021.

Crimp, mono, lock off, open hand, stem, mantle, toe hook, hand jamb, ring lock, smear - some combination of these moves accumulates to the completion of a climb. There are only so many types of problems. With the intuitive response to the materials this is mirrored in my studio. I’m curious how seemingly

separate parts interact within a system of movements. Stacking, throwing, pinching, slab building, all stand-alone as methods and integrate into fixed and unfixed connections and conceptual relationships. I split, slice, rip, dip, pinch, squeeze as the movements come together in varying order and consistency. In general, if it doesn’t feel right, I jump off as I am searching for a full-body and mind experience without impending death. However, some of the best

experiences come from pushing past the limits of my grip, expectations, anticipations, and fear.

Climbing and Geologic Formations in Rocky Mountain National Park, Rocklands South Africa, Fontainebleau France, Squamish BC.

Geologic Eye that Winks: (It’s a Relationship)

The rhythm of movement through the mountains has always had a way of wearing away the rough edges, smoothing and rounding. Over time I have learned to soften my relationship with clay. The process of making molds casts away the rougher edges of the work much like the erosion of the elements. It inspires me to build with less tension.

The wilderness humbles me by surface and color compositions. Whether high up in the alpine tundra or within depths of desert canyons, these layers in material time are unique. In my climbing travels all over the world, I have witnessed many transmutations of earth. I have felt with my own hands the distinct

texture of glacier dropped granite, and the water manicured softness of ancient sandstone. As an explorer, I’ve had the opportunity to witness marble from the top of a cathedral in Italy or a fossilized imprint embedded within sandstone in South Africa. These experiences both reveal qualities that I’m questioning about human’s relationship with materials and nature.

Each place has specific characteristics expressed in the geologic forms, foliage, and bodies of water interacting with one another. These visual vibrations

Ascension (Cylider Detail), Unfired Red Stoneware, Burnished Stained Terra Sigilata.

are a conduit of time through action and reaction of seismic transfers of energy and movement. Specifically, this travel has been a distinction to the qualities of color that I put into my work, the hues and tones are meant to transport the viewer as I see this as a source of unending vitality in my own experience.

The colors in these places are built into the structure of the environment. A mossy green waterfall, the ambrosia sand of a shoreline, or the muddy blue bank of a winding river can articulate a beautiful gradient of transition. I’m excited about how geologic terrain through weathering can reveal exposed layers of sedimentary waves of once liquid strata. Freezing the once malleable, moving magma. An

‘earth cylinder’ or core sample would show a machine cut representation of these frozen layers of history. The polished marble of a Corinthian column similarly refers to human’s relationship with the cylinder.

Glaze Detail of Panel, Porcelain, Glaze, Fuming Marks.

Approaching Sweetwater Installation, Red Stoneware, Porcelain, Unfired Red Stoneware, Burnished Terra Sigilatta, Glaze.

Igneous Longhand: (The Writing in the Stone)

Through a ceramic lens, I’m also exploring the concept of civilization’s authority over landscape and record of construction as a form of time materialized.

The geographical layered strata represent fragments or glimpses into the density of every assemblage. I watch as the intersections and overlaps contemplate the dynamic relationship between materiality and landscape and our attempt to control it. The polar and catalyzing balance between the interpretation of wilderness as nature at play, versus the gilded-green lawn as nature under

“totalitarian rule.”³ Jonathan Chapman in Emotionally Durable Design speaks about the geologic clock and how human consciousness is in its “infancy” in relation

to the infinite timescale of the earth. However, we try to rush an “ancient world to our purposes, ignorant perhaps of the messages buried in its long history.” ⁴ I often grapple with environmental stewardship, personal growth through editing, and the joy in our responsibility to grow conscious awareness and presence through my

3Jonathan Chapman, Emotionally Durable Design, vol. 1, Routledge, 2005, 46.

4 “ “

Brick and Mortar, Alfred Shale, Found and Fired Alfred Brick, 14”x 5” x 4”.

artistic vision. In the work I’ve been exploring the contrasting qualities and connotations of local small batch clay versus industrially mined materials for ceramic industry. In ‘The Sacred is the Mundane’ Sheila Pepe speaks to objects which are built with “well-understood histories of material geographies in mind.”⁵ Within my work, the Shale deposit here in Alfred is incorporating the local-material and history of this specific place into the process and the work.

5Pepe, Sheila, The Sacred Is the Mundane: Notes on Some Categories Monograph Series #34–2018, 8.

Shale and Yellow Porcelain Gradient Vase, Alfred Shale, Stained Porcelain, Porcelain, Glaze, 20”x 15”x 10”.

Within this I’m looking for the compositions to explore volume and implied volume to construct a kinesthetic visual experience. Just suppose the sharp and soft, wet and dry, clay and ceramic speak to these notions of manicured space in an attempt to cultivate order. Interiors become exteriors, and exteriors are revealed. I manipulate the materials minimally and the inherent qualities are categorized and processed. I’m searching for different algorithms of parts, tones, and colors as visual triggers in relationship to one another. The system is constantly in process of development, although certain features become relatively fixed. This becomes the structure.

The many states of clay intrigue me. There is an attempt at liberation and cohesion of clay and hand, tethering to a material reality that feels increasingly endangered. ⁶ I’m interested in the raw tonal qualities of clay, and how firing or not firing, glaze versus raw clay is perceived in the objects. There is a visual and physical weight of the different states of clay, raw to high fired and everywhere in between and I pay attention and use all with awareness. These concepts are all connected through a form of ideological material inquisition and pursuit of ephemerality within the fading life of wet clay. This concept is harkening back to that physical response to the continuum between clay and maker ceramic or rock and climber.

6Richard Sennett, The Craftsman, London: Penguin Books, 2009, 220.

The Apparition:

The image plays a role in the process in many forms, as a material image, an imprint, or cast. The material residue is suggestive of history and process.

There is a material dialogue between the natural process of erosion and cultural structuring of excavating. Geology is bolstered with volume. Layers can be built up and broken down. This can happen either over millennia or in the blink of an eye.

My memory foam on a ware cart becomes a mental impression of a bottle. That became my seed for further investigation. Feeling, time, touch, containment, more touch with conscious play. Imprints can be happenstance or intentional. The possibility to the body, a being, or object, something which was once there. Walter Benjamin, in The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction, conjures the

image of the magician vs. the surgeon in comparison to the cameraman and the painter.

“The painter while working observes a natural distance from the subject. The cameraman, on the other hand, penetrates deep into the

subject’s tissue.”⁷ I’ve been exploring the relationship between this duality.

7Benjamin, Walter. The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction. London: Penguin Books, 2008.

Cornerstone, Unfired Stoneware, Burnished Stained Terra Sigilatta.

Quick: (Liquidization of Material)

I’m continually enamored with the luscious layers of liquid material that is poured out onto a plaster slab to dry. The pieces which have germinated in this light aim at the ambition in my process is to capture the ephemerality of wet clay into a vitrified image of layers in time. Digging and grinding, the processing of clay fascinates me as it pertains to the mechanisms of liquidization. If these principles are applied to the human-driven process of clay making. There are so many variables, colors, and inherent properties possible at this stage.

The structural forms may take their shape a little later on, as the water evaporates, and the clay becomes workable with the hand. Though, how to be able to utilize the clay in this semi-liquid state? I have developed a variation on a

“Plemping Process.”⁸ I’m able to paint layer on layer of liquid clay generating a slow accumulation of sedimentation. When turned over an image is revealed. This projects an immediate sense of

the material, at the moment of wet clay making.

8Reijnders, Anton. The Ceramic Process. London: A & C Black, 2005, 125.

Plemp in Process in Studio, Applying One Layer at a Time.

Diurnal, Stoneware Plemp, Alfred Shale Terra Sigilatta, Stained Slip, Stainless Steel Mounts, 23”x27”x2.5”.

Zenith and Gateway Installation, Fosdick Nelson Gallery.

Sedimentary Striations of Cultivated Land: (Rock, Clay, Hand)

Is it the rock? The temperature? Or what I ate, maybe the noise level? The clay wetness? The answer is almost always, me in relation to that stimuli. Ann Lauterbach in ‘The Given and the Chosen’ speaks to the notion of “The Self,” she says, “I want to believe, it is layered and aspectual: it can shift and turn and connect variously to various stimuli.”⁹ I have found navigating when to look in and when to look out without over-gripping is a lifelong practice. Slowing down, softening, paying attention, takes both courage and diligence at times. This layer of the land we live on is but a blip on the geologic clock. The success and struggles are imprinted. This can become a vitrified image, a metamorphic strand of sedimentary grasses, or the pattern of a dense forest. A footprint on the shoreline or a fossilized imprint in the sand. Humans and the landscape are co-curators, whether we acknowledge it consciously or not.

9Lauterbach, Ann. The given and the Chosen. Richmond, Calif: Omnidawn Pub, 2011, 13.

Zenith Vase, Black Stained Porcelain, Glaze 22”x28”x11”, 2021.

Bibliography:

Akama, Yoko, Sarah Pink, and Shanti Sumartojo. Uncertainty and Possibility : New Approaches to Future Making in Design Anthropology London, Bloomsbury Academic, 2018.

Ament, Pat. John Gill: Master of Rock: The Life of a Bouldering Legend. Sheffield:

Vertebrate Publishing, 2018.

Benjamin, Walter. The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction. London:

Penguin Books, 2008.

Bohm, David. Thought as a System. Routledge, 2015.

Chapman, Jonathan. Emotionally Durable Design: Objects, Experiences and Empathy, Routledge, 2005.

Lauterbach, Ann. The given and the Chosen. Richmond, Omnidawn Pub, 2011.

Pepe, Sheila, The Sacred Is the Mundane: Notes on Some Categories Monograph Series 2018.

Reijnders, Anton. The Ceramic Process. A Manual and Source of inspiration for Ceramic Art and Design London: A & C Black, 2005.

Sennett, Richard. The Craftsman. London: Penguin Books, 2009.

Technical Statement: (Formula, Recipe, Process)

The Starting Formula:

“My thesis can be looked at close or far away.

The thesis does not have a subject to it, because subjects can change.

It is about exploration, touch and connectivity.

It’s about practice, discipline, and agility.

It’s about place.

My thesis is the place.

This is the process.”

- J.Gill speaking on J. Donofrio Thesis

Grandma Boulder, The Buttermilks, Bishop, CA. 2008

Plemp Clay Body

I researched plemp clay bodies as a way to solve issues pertaining to strength shrinkage, and tension in the process of creating large undulating panels made from plaster molds. Compositionally, a plemp body is somewhere in between a sculpture body and a casting body and has a spreadable consistency. I use flax fibers and nylon fibers but paper is also recommended for cohesion and green strength by Anton Reijnders in The Ceramic Process. The aim is to make the plemp, like a casting slip, using as little water as possible to achieve workable properties.

Clay Bodies:

Outdoor Sculpture Body: From Val Cushing Handbook

For plemp add:

41 – 43% of total h20 – 5 gallon bucket – 10,000g batch - 9lbs

.2 - .25% sodium silicate – 5 gallons bucket – 10,000g batch 20g - 25g .1% flax fibers , .2% Nylon fibers

Porcelain Sculpture:

(version of 747 with less iron and more molchite and more cost effective)

For Plemp add:

49 – 51% of total h20 – 5 gallon bucket – 10,000g batch 13 – 14lbs .2 - .29% sodium silicate – 5 gallons bucket – 10,000g batch 23g - 33g .1% flax fibers, .2% Nylon fibers

A Plemping Process Surface Design:

Positive side of plaster mold.

Shale terra sigillata and WDB slip blended together in gradient of color painted on the plaster surface using latex as resist.

Application:

Layers of semi-liquid plemp base clay are applied slowly in even layers with a wide soft bristle paint brush. Consistency is key and I aim for a thick Greek yogurt like paste.

Flipping and Drying:

Once dried overnight on the mold, I use compressed air for release. The panel on the mold is pivoted upright with protective foam underneath. Ready to receive is a plaster mold made specifically for drying. The two molds form a plaster sandwich and the panel gets transferred in the vertical orientation. I then cover the panel with cheese cloth to allow for even drying.

You need two people.

Firing:

Firing takes place on a bed of sand, soft bricks shims, and kiln blanket which support the undulations of the panel. The kiln blanket also expedites the cooling rate of the bottom surface to match the cooling rate of the top surface more closely. Before the kiln the blanket, all the work had large cooling cracks. I then build a saggar of sorts to further help control the cooling with bricks and kiln shelfs over the piece to prevent the top surface from cooling too rapidly. I made sure to always have the sand trap filled on the car kiln. If I was using a kiln that was a quick cooler, I might run a down firing schedule.

Other Recipes:

Rado-red Stoneware: Cone 04 -10

• Extremely workable red stoneware great for throwing and hand building.

Remove grog for wheel throwing body.

Slips:

Bringle Wet Dry Bisque-Everything Slip Add 5-15 % of colorant for slips.

Glazes:

Ron Meyers Clear Base: Cone 04-10

• For White Add 5-10% Zirocpax

• For Color Add 5-10% Colorant

Turner Beauty: Cone 5-10

Steve’s Runny Green: From Val Cushing Handbook

• For maximum crystal growth thin application is best and slow cooling or down firing.

VC Satin Black Glaze: from Val Cushing Handbook