Cutie or scary? Maybe a little bit both – introducing American artist, Colin J. Radcliffe. Scroll down pine over this amazing selection of his works!
Artist statement
Chronicling my successes and failures in love, my work is autobiographical and at times confessional. I focus on my personal experiences of love, sex, and intimacy in the context of queer digital space. While deceptively playful, both the phones and figurative ceramics explore my ambivalence in love, and the dynamics of queer relationships today, especially as they relate to dating apps and social media. Each work is a personal memory, an ode to a romantic or sexual partner and own connection to one another (or lack thereof). Infatuation, humor, and playfulness simultaneously spur the making of each piece alongside loneliness, disdain, and lewdity. Caressed into form from a porcelain clay body and then fired with experimental combinations of low and high-fire glazes, each work endures a literal trial by fire resulting in final glaze colors that can be wildly unpredictable, much like love.
Stemming from my over-attachment and reliance on my phone, particularly in forming queer friendships and romances, the ceramic phones often pull directly from my interactions on dating apps like Grindr, Jack’d, and Tinder. While the figures are instead based off of past lovers, mixing often unspoken sentiments and traumas with the perception or memory of a particular partner.
From working hands into wet clay, the very same hands that held and caressed a particular lover or that exchanged intimate text messages, I cultivate an imprint of tenderness, humor, and emotional immediacy in each piece.
Find more: @colinmemaybe / www.colinjradcliffe.com
