Bridget fairbank makes pottery, installation art, and orchestrates happenings- all of which aim for the re-imagining of everyday actions and relations. The handcrafted object is now the subversive object. Her utilitarian items act sometimes as objects of irony, sometimes as objects of intimacy and sometimes as a means to an educational end. A revolution is cooking in the kiln.
Biography
Bridget Fairbank makes installation art + orchestrates happenings for the re-imagining of everyday actions and relations. Born in the mountains of beautiful British Columbia, her childhood was spent exploring nature and making her own fun, perhaps this is why her work is often project based. Since childhood, she has traveled the world making art and seeking education.
A University of Florida MFA, NSCAD University BFA, residencies from Miami-to-Berlin have punctuated twelve-years of wildfire-spotting for Alberta Forestry. These experiences led her to value traditional hand crafts and also embrace technology in the globalized world. As as teacher and technician Fairbank is part of the movement redefining the field. She knows one thing: the earth connects us all and that earth is made of clay.
ARTist statement
I use the metaphorical landscapes of food as a catalyst for making work about the discourses that mediate our relationships. I find comfort in the mundane but can’t help wanting to shatter the monotony of the everyday. Working with clay is my way of revolt, my philosophy that the everyday is exceptional and that we must pay attention to what we use.
Making is a way of thinking. Through it I contemplate the fast paced lives we live and time itself, deliberate on cultural complexities, our way of sharing, learning, destroying and the role mealtime has to play in our North American food crisis. I ruminate on respect and impermanence and climate change. I think of home, nature and globalization through clay and the hand crafted vessel. Ceramics does not give me peace of mind, it is a process that fuels my mind. My functional tableware is bright and bold, edgy and comfortable. Through supple form and surface they ask the user to engage attentively, mindfully, with the actions of use and material consumption. My large sculpture is paired, asking a person to engage bodily with an idea.
A revolution is cooking in the kiln.
curriculum vitae
