Peter Pincus‘ elegant ceramics are instantly recognizable as his alone. the slip-cast porcelain vessels that make up Inset build on Pincus’ exploration of the history of ceramics, his technical expertise and understanding of color. The result is a dynamic perceptual experience as though an intimate tactile Op art.

In the world of ceramics Peter Pincus is a master of perfection. In his work, color and form are bound together as if neither could exist without the other. The complexity and hard work of Pincus’ studio practice is concealed from us in the final presentation. The creative invention of form, the precise technique of developing and casting complex molds, and the honing of a finely tuned color palette seem effortless and we see only beauty, exquisite color and form unmarred by struggle or hard work. Perfection of form is often delineated by slivers of cast colored porcelain, fine tuned to color harmonies, more akin to painting than to clay, or grey scales, tuned as though music.

Pincus holds a M.F.A. and B.F.A. from the New York State College of Ceramics at Alfred University. He currently holds the position of Visiting Assistant Professor in Ceramics at the School for American Crafts at Rochester Institute of Technology, NY. His ceramics can be found in numerous public and private collections, including the recent acquisition by the Daum Museum of Contemporary Art, Sedalia, MO.

A large-scale, textile triptych titled Towers by British artist Alice Kettle. The artist created the work in response to the 2001 attack on the World Trade Center. After the work was first shown in the U.S. during a 2009 Surface Design Conference in Kansas City, the artist gifted Towers to the Belger Collection so that it would remain in the U.S. We are honored to have received this special gift and to share it with visitors. To learn more about Alice Kettle, please visit her website.

Cary Esser‘s new series of intimate ceramic wall works, Minerality, explore the alchemy of glaze and the mystery of lacuna. Variations of form and the skin of surface on Esser’s book-sized structures are glazed with crystal, lusters of percious metal and vibrant color.

An ongoing connection between organic and geometric structures in my work has played a role in the creation and evolution of each new series. My early sensibilities as an artist were influenced by our built environments, and in particular by tiles and ornament with motifs of flora and fauna.

Esser is the Chair of Ceramics at the Kansas City Art Institute. Her work is in the collections of Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art, Overland Park, KS; Daum Museum of Contemporary Art, Sedalia, MO; Archie Bray Foundation, Helena, MT; John Michael Kohler Art Center, Sheboygan, WI, and numerous others.

Patty Carroll continues her exploration of every-woman in Miss Adventures a series of photographic, primarily domestic, tableaus that her anonymous women inhabit. Bad judgement and overwhelming décor choices pave the road to happiness.

The photographs of Patty Carroll are held in the permanent collections of the Nelson Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO; the Museum of Contemporary Photography, Chicago, IL; The Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY; Library of Congress, Washington, DC, Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, IL, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC and numerous others.

Derek Au, Eliza Au, Yewen Dong, Sin-ying Ho, Jing Huang, Nuokan Huang, Wanying Liang, Shiyuan Xu, ChengOu Yu

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Journeys features the ceramic works of nine artists who were either born in China or are of Chinese descent. The exhibition explores themes of identity in a multicultural world, examining both the juxtapositions and intersections between Eastern and Western cultures. Duality and the vacillation between two worlds is present within each artist’s body of work as well as throughout the exhibition.

The passage of time is captured in the crumbling facades of Yewen Dong’s two large-scale wall works. These unfired clay tiles explore the residual traces of touch and memory. Memory also plays a role in the floral porcelain pieces by Wanying Liang. Liang’s works give form to her memories of childhood in China, the questions she has for her mother, and personal struggles with her own body. The physical and mental distance between past and present drives the work of Jing Huang as she constructs ambiguous landscapes that are neither here nor there. Eliza Au utilizes computer-aided methods to reference historical architecture. Au’s wireframe-like pieces explore the limits of interior and exterior space, strength and fragility, and reference both mathematics and the patterns of religious ornamentation. In his series “Simulant,” Derek Au toys with concepts of authenticity and tradition with his use of alternative materials to mimic traditional Chinese porcelain and glaze. Fragility and strength, order and chaos, simplicity and complexity are all present in the amoeba-like forms of Shiyuan Xu. Xu’s porcelain structures reference cellular organisms and the rhythms of growth in response to internal and external forces. The relationship between position and perspective is central to the work of ChengOu Yu as he explores the way experience is distorted based on location. The tiny pottery landscapes of Nuokan Huang feel both contained and limitless – delicate scenes of personal space and boundless imagination. In contrast to the minuscule works of Nuokan Huang is the human-scale vessel of Sin-ying Ho. Ho’s work is covered in cultural, religious, and economic symbolism and touches on themes of dislocation, globalization, and identity. Journeys encompasses an intense blend of imagery combined with traditional and contemporary fabrication techniques and embodies a complex collision of cultures.