Nature/Nurture
Ceramics
Colour Maisch, Renewal III, 2023;
July 1 -July 30, 2023
Adrienne Fierman, Amy Dov, Babs Haenen, Carey Lowell, Colour Maisch, Jane Yang D’Haene, Kelly Klein, Leah Kaplan, and Nicole Corbett
Onna House is pleased to present Nature/Nurture, a group exhibition of recent work by contemporary ceramicists. With practices based locally and internationally, these artists mold clay in unique and inventive ways—unearthing ceramics inspired by natural and spiritual environments. Nature/Nurture features artwork by Adrienne Fierman, Amy Dov, Babs Haenen, Carey Lowell, Colour Maisch, Jane Yang D’Haene, Kelly Klein, Leah Kaplan, and Nicole Corbett—each piece reflecting the artist’s nurturing hand.
Drawing inspiration from flora and fauna, Amy Dov molds organic and woven clay forms that are coated with glazes and oxides so they resemble natural elements like rocks, bones, rust, branches, and reeds. Adrienne Fierman’s rough and refined hand-built work is composed intuitively, influenced by the unique qualities of nature found in materials ranging from driftwood to seedpods and fallen leaves. Colour Maisch invites natural cycles to guide her, folding foraged vegetation into porcelain before she fires the clay and submerges each vessel in an ink bath to color the ceramic—highlighting the beauty of decay across human, animal, and plant life.
Making connections between clay and the earth’s surface, Babs Haenen’s Turbulent Vessels, made from a patchwork of porcelain, and Scholar’s Rock, influenced by stones collected in the Song Dynasty, are hybrids of geology and architecture. Kelly Klein’s charred and volcanic surface textures are achieved by exposing her clay body to open flame—each piece marked with rich coal-colored scorches. Jane Yang D’Haene’s work creates a portal between traditional ceramics from her Korean heritage and innovative surface treatments revealing stone-like textures that resemble imperfect planetary forms.
Celebrating the physical and mystical ritual of molding, Carey Lowell’s flower and bird ornamented ceramics are temple-like mandalas inspired by Marija Gimbutas' writings on goddesses that encourage the viewer to stop, breathe, and be present. Leah Kaplan’s translucent porcelain vessels cast an ethereal glow, applying age-old techniques of pinching, coiling, and slab building that result in luminous and intricate textures. Nicole Corbett’s ceramics explore art as a spiritual path that unifies the psychological and natural; incorporating her body and hair in the work, each vessel contains her raw emotion and vulnerability.
As the exhibition’s curator Lisa Perry explains, “The ceramic artists included in this show all seem to have a common thread; believing that clay, coming directly from Mother Earth, is to be cherished and nurtured and loved. For many of them it’s a spiritual practice which helps them feel very connected to their work. I find that really beautiful.” Dedicated to non-traditional forms of creating, Nature/Nurture offers a space for artists who are unafraid to welcome the wild.
Adrienne Fierman
Adrienne Fierman has been working with clay for over thirty years, exploring the traditional hand-building methods of coiling and pinching. After studying at Greenwich House in New York City, Adrienne attended workshops at Anderson Ranch, Peter’s Valley, and on the Taos Pueblo, where she was influenced by the indigenous approach of “listening to the clay” and working intuitively. The Japanese concept of wabi-sabi—embracing simplicity and imperfection—has impacted her work as well. Presently, Adrienne is a handbuilding instructor at the Clay Art Guild, in Watermill, Long Island.
Amy Dov
Amy Dov was born in 1970 in Los Angeles, California, where she currently lives and works. She received her BA from the University of California, Santa Cruz, in Painting and Printmaking, and became a Master Printer at the Tamarind Institute at the University of New Mexico in 1995. Her ceramic sculptures and wall hangings incorporate elements of nature and biomorphic forms. The layers of delicate oxides and glazes mimic the decay of the living world and quiet observation of the passage of time. The wall hangings are woven together with linen, gathering the shapes, to make a painting in a way, a composition of the forms. The linen cord acts like a rhythm, like a drawing, against the clay.
Babs Haenen
Babs Haenen creates expressive and impressionistic ceramics that give equal importance to color, line, and form. Her works are embellished in a painterly manner, highlighting the influence of abstract painting and landscape motifs, like rippling water, on her practice. Haenen's works with coloured porcelain slabs and builds colorful, organic vessels with a dynamic inner choreography. Layering the slabs with pigment allows her to form thin ribbons of coloured porcelain, which she folds, cuts, and sculpts to create her vessels. Lately, Haenen's work has gone from vertical vessel forms to more complex works that incorporate two or more separate pieces creating colorful tabletop landscapes and Scholar’s Rocks. Haenen first worked as a dancer before studying visual art at the Gerrit Rietveld Academy, Amsterdam, from 1974 to 1979, where she later taught from 1994-2013. In 1990 and 2003, Haenen received a grant from the Netherlands Foundation for Visual Arts in Design and Architecture. She was the recipient of 1991 Inax Design Prize for Europeans, Japan. In 2012, she was granted the Mondriaan Fund in Visual Arts and Cultural Heritage. Recently, Haenen was awarded the 2020 Van Achterbergh Prize. Haenen is represented by Hostler Burrows Gallery, who partnered with Onna House to exhibit her work.
Carey Lowell
Carey Lowell was born in New York and raised all over the world as a result of her father's work as a petroleum geologist. She attended public high school in Colorado which is where she was first introduced to clay. She attended the University of Colorado in Boulder then transferred to NYU her sophomore year. She modeled and acted in film and television until she chose to pursue ceramics full time. She has a studio in upstate NY where she mostly hand builds in porcelain. Lowell considers her ceramics to be a practice in mindfulness, sculpting clay into intricate mobiles and mandalas that reference historical, spiritual, and environmental consciousness.
Colour Maisch
Colour Maisch is originally from Salt Lake City, Utah, and grew up in Southern California. She received her BA in Spanish and Political Science and her MFA in Sculpture/Ceramics at the University of Utah. She has exhibited throughout Utah and in surrounding western states, is the recipient of several artists grants, and—amongst other residencies—was Utah Museum of Contemporary Art’s Artist in Residence. In addition to her own practice, Colour taught art at the University of Utah and facilitated art classes for refugee children as a way to promote language skills and creative exploration within the Salt Lake Valley. Colour believes that creativity is an inherent part of being human and that accessing our creativity is a way to still our minds and broaden our perspective about the world around us. Currently, she lives and works in downtown Salt Lake City with her partner, five-year-old child, dog, and cat.
Jane Yang D’Haene
Born in South Korea, Jane Yang-D’Haene draws upon her cultural heritage to create unexpected ceramic work. After moving to New York City in 1984, D’Haene attended the Cooper Hewitt School of Architecture from 1988 to 1992. She went on to work as an interior designer for a major architectural firm, honing her eye for masterful design. Since beginning her work in ceramics in 2016, D’Haene has experimented with form and function, quickly establishing herself as an artist capable of innovating the medium. D’Haene often works within the language of traditional Korean ceramic forms, using parts of this long standing history as a vehicle for experimentation. She builds upon these forms, integrating contemporary techniques, colors, and textures to create sculptural vessels that toe the line between art and design. Through this manipulation of her medium and reinterpretation of her history, D’Haene creates one-of-a-kind objects that breathe new life into a centuries-old craft.
Kelly Klein has been involved in the fashion industry for over 40 years. After she graduated from FIT in New York City, she worked as an assistant to Ralph Lauren and as an assistant designer to Calvin Klein. After leaving fashion, Kelly started her photography career. She has worked for numerous magazines such as British Vogue, German Vogue, French Vogue, Russian Vogue, Italian Marie Claire, Harper's Bazaar, Interview, Jane, and A Magazine. Kelly has also shot advertising campaigns for Bacara Hotel, Park Hyatt, and Sam Edelman shoes. She has produced and written six coffee-table photography books, of which she has donated all of her proceeds to various charities, such as God’s Love We Deliver, Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation, CFDA/Vogue Initiative, and the Equestrian AIDS Foundation. In 2016, Kelly started studying ceramics in New York City, where Kelly Klein Ceramics was born. Klein started creating and designing modern ceramics at her home in Palm Beach. During the COVID lockdown, she created an isolation totem and large hand-coiled wood-fired pots. Her most recent design is a bronze egg, for which she is donating all of her proceeds to gun violence prevention. Klein lives between Palm Beach and New York with her son Lukas, and her two dogs Precious and Rocky.
Leah Kaplan has been working in clay for more than thirty years, honing her craft in studios up and down the East Coast. In 2018, Leah bought and renovated her own space in Old City, Philadelphia, from which she launched her full-time practice. Leah’s eclectic career path to ceramics included promoting New York City designers, as well as helping global artisans find markets for their work. In the latter job, Leah was fortunate to meet gifted craftspeople, engaged in every conceivable medium, whose work continues to inform her practice decades later. Leah’s vessels have been shown in internationally juried shows across the United States and can be found in corporate and private collections. Beyond her studio practice, Leah devotes time to The Clay Studio, a national nonprofit arts organization, on whose board she serves. Leah lives in Philadelphia with her husband and three children.
Nicole Corbett is a multidisciplinary artist, entrepreneur, and creative director, from Los Angeles, CA. Corbett’s art is deeply rooted in her practice of Zen Buddhism and encompasses ceramics, photography, mixed media, and performance. She is best known for her hand-built stoneware vessels which she uses as three dimensional canvases for abstract painting using her own hair. Nicole’s work explores themes of emptiness, surrender, emotional freedom, spiritual experiences, and female sexuality. Prior to focusing exclusively on her fine art practice, Nicole founded and led the NY-based creative agency Worn as CEO & Creative Director. As a pioneering women-focused agency in NYC, Worn created millions of dollars worth of creative work for venture-led startups and Fortune 500 companies with her team of fifteen Brooklyn-based employees. She first combined art with creative entrepreneurship in 2010 when she founded Worn Magazine, a bi-annual print fashion and art publication based in Washington, DC. The magazine spotlighted East Coast emerging talent across the worlds of hip-hop, street art, food, and fashion.
