The Times Quotidian

There has been much said about the satire and punster atmosphere of the work of Adrian Saxe. But when asked point blank “What interests you about your work?” Saxe responds without pause, “the space, how you operate it… you know, how you drive the car.” Like most, I have have focused on the shear visceral and astounding technical prowess of Saxe’s ceramics. His mastery of historical appropriation played against tongue in cheek post-modernism is what catches our attention, but for Saxe it is covert feasibility that keeps him up at night.

Saxe’s vessels are operational. His ewers pour, maybe only for the most rarified of ritual, but that is up to the collector’s discretion. “…operation of the vessels in their intended use, even if only once (and subsequently in the imagination or mental appropriation of potential use) is what interests me. The viewer’s speculation about touching and moving the operational parts, with or without actually using the piece for its implied or understood use, becomes important. I often have a weird or discomforting device as a handle or spout on a ewer or covered jar. The physical encounter and interactivity is only one of many aspects of pottery, but it can be paramount for fully experiencing the work and understanding the intentionality behind it.”

His simple statement that ceramics both occupies and contains space took me by surprise. It dawned on me, while the rest of us have been satisfied with being seduced by the lush glazing, detailed surfacing and titillating lusters, Saxe has been “driving” the container. That the exterior and interior operate on a quid pro basis is at the core of Saxe’s preoccupation. Perhaps the consummate expression of this are his Klein Bottles. Saxe delights at the equation used for execution and the precise point of perpetual return. He giggles with glee at the ant, who no matter how long he journeys, always stays on the same surface of the object. These vessels turn in on themselves so that what was once hidden is now revealed. This is no pun, but a true rendering of concept.

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