Earlier this month, I much enjoyed the opening of Lacoste Gallery’s current exhibit, “The Transcendent Vessel,” which features astonishingly-large thrown stoneware vessels by California ceramicist Darcy Badiali.
I especially liked the delicacy of his works, which, in some cases, resemble giant eggshells. Other pieces, he explains, “are reminiscent of plants, stones coral and other objects found in nature, ” with surfaces that look or feel like elephant skin or craters. While the forms have their origin in function, ” he adds, “the scale lends itself to sculptural issues of space.
Badiali’s works are included in the permanent collections of Sam and Alfreda Maloof Foundation for the Arts, Alta Loma, CA, American Museum of Ceramic Art, Los Angeles, CA, Kathryn H. Herberger Museum, Tempe, AZ, Daum Museum of Art, Sedalia, MO, Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art, Overland Park, KS, Kansas City Art Institute, Kansas City, MO, Archie Bray Foundation, Helena, MT, and in Shigaraki, Japan in the Shiro Otani Collection.
At the Lacoste Gallery in Concord MA through May 27.
—Anita M. Harris
Anita Harris is a writer and photographer based in Cambridge, MA.
New Cambridge Observer is a publication of the Harris Communications Group, also in Cambridge.
Leave a Reply