object eye
Walter Auer — HYPERCLAY
Wednesday October 12 2011
Welcome to the first of our 8-part series, where each week we will introduce you to one of the artists involved in our current exhibition, HYPERCLAY: Contemporary Ceramics. You can see the rest of the series by clicking here.
This week: Walter Auer.
Auer’s two works on display at Object Gallery, entitled The Anarchist, 2011 and The Insider, 2011, take a unique approach to ceramics. While they appear slipcast (where a liquid clay ‘slip’ is poured into a mould), they are in fact mummified, or petrified, in terra sigillata, which is a liquid containing the smallest and lightest clay particles. Auer has taken stuffed bears, removed their fillings and replaced them with wood shavings, before soaking them in this terra sigillata, proposing and shaping them, and then firing them in a kiln. A video, one of those featured in the iPad app within the exhibition, explaining the process in more depth is available in our Video & Audio Gallery, by clicking here.
Auer, born in Italy, has been based in Australia for the last fourteen years. He discovered ceramics whilst working as a chef in Basel, Switzerland — after attending a ceramics exhibition, he fell in love and hasn’t looked back, having since studied and worked around the world, in countries such as Italy, Japan and now Australia.
The bears on display are the culmination of seven years of work and experimentation with this process — they are his biggest works in this ‘mummification’ series. Somewhat deceptive, they look cuddly, like you could curl up next to them on a cold night, but are in fact just memories of these objects. Once loved toys, now only remnants of the original remain, housed within a petrified shell.
Truly striking, we’re lucky to have a few smaller works from Auer available for purchase from our Collector’s Cabinet at the Gallery in Surry Hills, so drop by to check them out. Two extra works in the series will also join The Anarchist and The Insider on the national tour.
Don’t miss HYPERCLAY at any of its locations over the next few years, and you can also see three more videos on Auer — a profile, a commentary from Bruce McWhinney, Head of Ceramics at Northern Beaches College, TAFE, and another from Fine Arts student Ben Thorn.
HYPERCLAY is at Object: Australian Centre for Design until 8 January 2012 before touring nationally — click here for a full list of dates and venues.
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Visiting Object
St. Margarets, 417 Bourke St
Surry Hills NSW 2010
Tuesday-Friday: 11am-5pm
Saturday & Sunday: 10am-5pm
Free admission
+61 2 9361 4511
gallery@object.com.au
