Kyle Carpenter Solo Exhibit
Opened February 27, 2010
Kyle Carpenter creates sturdy but refined ceramic vessels and honors them with elegant illustrations and pattern. He and the work move between two physical studios and modes of creating. He crafts form with traditional studio pottery techniques in Asheville's River Arts District, then shifts to his home studio where he adapts watercolor methods to ceramic materials to grace the works with painstaking illustrations and elegant, rhythmic brushwork.
This exhibits marks ten years since he graduated with his BFA from UNCA Asheville, as well as a move to a new river district studio and a new addition to his family. He is at an important point of transition and opportunity, as reflected in several new avenues of exploration in his work in recent months. This exhibit will include over 100 new works that provide both a record of the past, as well as tantalizing glimpses of what may come in this, his next decade.
Images of individual works for this past exhibit are available in the video below.
More About Kyle Carpenter Solo Exhibit
"As a studio potter, I work diligently to make well-crafted wares for everyday people. It's seemingly less about the "ritual of the table" and more about respecting a long tradition of craftsmen before me and discovering my own voice. As a contemporary potter, I often look to past traditions for inspiration. I'm interested in folk pottery of many origins. My native state of North Carolina, of course, offers a deep well of talented potters, both folk and contemporary, to look towards for inspiration. The "mingei" arts and crafts movement, of Japan, has offered an overwhelming influence to so many potters throughout history, including myself. I want to continue the long tradition of making beautiful wares for everyday people."
"Simplicity in form offers a broad surface for me to embellish with lines, patterns, and drawings. Before I was introduced to the ceramics arts, I did a fair amount of illustration before and during art school. The combination of three-dimensional forms and two-dimensional drawings was a natural fusion of both my love of drawing and pottery, art and craft. It is my intention to bring together clear and abstract markings to engage the viewer to look closely at how design relates to the form of the pot."