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Main themes addressed

 

In my exhibitions, I usually present my workpieces by themes.

Here are a few:

 

 
 
 
 

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 Korean jars

 

 
  HANG HA LI – CHANG DOK

A "hang ha li", or Korean jar, has a very strong cultural overtone in Korea.
"Hang ha li" are sandstone jars which, for centuries, have been used by Korean families to keep food. "Kimchi" for example, a spicy cabbage dish eaten with every Korean meal, could be kept a whole winter in a "hang ha li" half buried in a garden or simply stored in a courtyard. No wonder they were so popular! Today, fridges have replaced these jars, but they still have a future as art pieces. Well sought after, these jars are now decorating modern flats, bringing along their design and their familiar aspects.

A "chang dok" is a set of "hang ha li", put in half circles, the smaller in front, the bigger at the back.

Hi Suk's approach is double: to carry on the "hang ha li" tradition, and to turn them into present day objects.
By playing with sizes, shapes and colors, Hi Suk projects the "hang ha li" towards modernity, turning them into purely art objects.

A few words about technics:
A "hang ha li" is made out of sandstone, fired at about 1300°C. Enamels are iron oxide based (not toxic), so can handle food. A 50 cm high "hang ha li" weighs about 10 kg, and requires about 40 kg of clay!
 

 
 
 
 

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  Our endangered planet

 

 
  OUR ENDANGERED PLANET

Today, everyone knows that man damages his environment, and that we reached a stage where we have to choose between irreversible degradations OR take new directions to find a sustainable balance between man and nature.

To emphasize this idea, artists have a role to play. That's why the ceramicist Hi Suk has created a set of artworks aiming at showing today's earth state.
Through these tormented and worn out artworks, we can see how much our planet is already damaged.
If you become aware of this issue while watching these objects, then the artist's goal is reached.

Art in general and pottery in particular, through its many firings, has a sizeable carbon weight. The artist is then inclined to make up for this carbon weight by using in her daily life as much as possible clean energy (solar energy, air heat pump, photo-voltaic electricity, rain water recycling, refuse composting, hybrid car... and so on).
 

 
 
 
 

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  BOTTLES

 

 
  BOTTLES

With enough “if”, we could put Paris into a bottle!
A drunkard’s purse is a bottle...
These are two of many sayings involving a bottle.
Bottles have been closed to and part of men's culture for so long that the word “bottle”, so frequent in many proverbs, instantly raises in our mind a vast and poetic universe.

Dictionary view:
A container with an opening, a neck, usually cylindrical, more or less long, more or less narrow, designed to hold a liquid.

Artist's view:
From top to bottom, a bottle anatomy is:
an opening
a neck
a belly
a bottom
What makes the difference between a factory made bottle and an artist's bottle is the artist's capacity to play with this anatomy. A narrow opening, a long neck, a full belly and a plain bottle turns into a piece of art.
Its utility aspect is then totally offset by its artistic quality.
 

 
 
 
 

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 Eggs

 

 
  EGGS

The egg, one of life original shapes, is not only a volume endowed with remarkable mathematical features, it is also a shape bringing peace and harmony to mind.

An egg gives life. But a soft boiled egg is food.

After consumption, what remains beyond a chipped shell is a contrast between the original shape harmony AND the wounds and marks of destruction left by the consumer.

This contrast is what the artist tries to put forward through these huge exotic and colored eggs.
 

 
 
 
 

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  Teapots

 

 
  TEAPOTS

My teapots are definitely more for the eyes than for making tea, though this could be possible.

But their best quality, by far, is their always re-invented shapes, sizes and colors.
Fitted with eccentric straight or arched handles, they have unmatched lids, blooming with unheard of flowers!
Shapes include cubes, cones, cylinders, eggs or ball shapes.
Sprouts are any size, any length, nearly anywhere!

In a few words, not chocolate teapots but rather fairy tale teapots.
 

 
 
 
 

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  Bamboos

 

 
  BAMBOOS

Here's a few interesting facts about bamboos (Wikipedia):

Bamboos are used as food, as ornamental plants, as tools, for fighting soil erosion, to remove some toxins in the soil. Bamboos fix 30 % more CO2 than trees and have a very small ecological imprint. Out of bamboos can be made pulp, textile, furniture, floors, fishing rods, music instruments... and so on.
Who, besides Jacques Prevert, could compete with such a long list?

At last, it is well known that bamboos bend but don't break off.
Exactly the opposite of a ceramic! you might say.
So, a sandstone bamboo is a paradox!
But certainely not for an artist. The proof is before your eyes!
 

 
 
 
 

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  Trays

 

 
  TRAYS

My large trays have a simple shape, usually square, sometimes round or polygonal.
But I like to decorate them with cheerful, modern and colorful patterns.

So, from trays, they become paintings!

 
 

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