Thanks to Clay Art Center, You May Never Look at a Dinner Plate the Same Way Again

Learning to render a ceramic bowl in pottery class is one thing, but utilizing that skill to turn an otherwise ordinary object into a masterpiece defines an artist.

This month's show at the Clay Art Center, called  Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner?, featuring 110 clay-makers from around the United States, proved that a platter can be more than a piece of dinnerware to hold a heap of mashed potatoes.  Artists played with shape, texture, color and detail when creating their ceramic canvasses.

“Anybody can make a plate, but you find you can do a lot more with it once you create it in a different way,” said museum-goer Peggy Simmons.

That individuality shone through in the intricate detailing of Lynn Smiser Bowers’ piece, "Butterfly," on which butterflies seemed to be dancing across smooth edges splashed in blue, green and orange paint.

Viewers responded to Bowers' piece by stepping in for a closer look at the mid-sized work.

“I don’t do work the same way, so I can appreciate the detail—it’s fascinating,” said Simmons.

Although the exhibition opened nearly a month ago, positive buzz about the show has continued to bring in a steady stream of art lovers since then.

For example, Simmons and other spectators came all the way from a pottery studio in Queens to sneak a peek at the functional, the decorative, and the diverse.

"Once you get close, [it] draws in the eye as you follow the patterns,” said Grace Anker, who marveled at the architecture behind Peter Arnow’s yellow and sea-foam green dishes.

Anker said the exhibition was a reminder of the complexity of creating ceramics.

“The [assortment] added to the richness of the whole craft. It’s an opportunity to see familiar things interpreted in a new way,” she said.

Executive Director Reena Kashyap, Program Director Leigh Mickelson, and  artists-in-residences Ariel Plantz and Andrew Coombs were just a few Clay Art Center affiliates whose work appeared in the show.

Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner? will be remain on display at Clay Art Center until March 5th, 2011.