The “I Am a Puppet” series are life-sized, ceramic figures. The puppets were casted from life and their size makes them immediately relatable. The cracked surfacing on the puppets symbolizes life’s journey, especially the hardships and experiences that people go through. We all carry scars, emotionally and physically, that make us who we are. The structural frame represents the world that we live in and the strings are metaphors for our connections and sometimes restraints to that world.

Bar Shacterman is a Northern Californian ceramic sculptor with a diverse, international background. Born in Odessa, Russia, his family immigrated to Israel when he was 6. It was there he received his training at the Academy of Art in Tel Aviv. After traveling through Europe, India and an apprenticeship in Japan, the artist and his family finally settled on the West Coast.

Shacterman describes himself as:

“A Hole in a Flute” (Hafiz, Sufi Teacher). The images, experience, fascinations that are my life move through me into something new. What I love most about the process is that it takes me to a different dimension – a place that I haven’t visited yet – technically and conceptually.

A work of art is meaningful to me when it expands my understanding of the materials I work with and the images and the ideas that live with me.

My interest in clay was originally inspired by traditional Japanese clay work. In many of the traditional works, I could feel the clay expressing itself; Nature forming around green tea. My work is also inspired by the great contemporary clay artists Peter Voulkos, Paul Soldner and Rudy Autio.

I use a gas kiln and usually fire it at cone 6 to 9. Some of my work, I fire using Noborigama (multiple chamber) and Anagama (single chamber) kilns. The unexpected coming together (jamming) of materials, traditions, and ideas to create something new inspires my work today. It is something I am interested in experiencing, creating and evoking in others.”

The maquette is a model for a project that includes information about the construction and reception of that project. As such, it can incorporate a strategic plan that, by creating a temporality separate from the space of production or consumption, opens up layers of consideration that make room for the idea of a ‘artistic discourse’ that critically assesses the project in terms of its opportunities and foreclosures. The maquette can involve manipulation of the point of view, margins, imaginary observers (fictims), and narratives about the life of the art object itself. As Picasso’s maquettes make clear, the work’s dimensionality is open for consideration. Spaces and time sequences may be ‘inserted’ to create certain points of instability or opportunity.

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In 1985, Kanna earned a Bachelor of Arts degree cum laude in both Fine Art and Math at University of the Pacific, and was awarded Outstanding Senior in Art. Her primary medium at that time was serigraphy where the subjects of her work were distilled to composition, shapes and color. Soon thereafter she moved to San Francisco with her husband Mark van Bronkhorst and worked for several years in commercial surface design for clients such as Joe Boxer, Williams-Sonoma and Pottery Barn.

Having taken a break from commercial work to raise her children, Kanna now lives in the Berkeley area and has returned to fine art, working in oils since 2003. Currently, she is represented by Studio Gallery and SFMOMA Artists Gallery, both in San Francisco.

Drawn to the spirit of experimentation and nonconformity that characterizes ceramic sculpture in California, Downing moved to San Francisco in 1985 and became exposed to a broad spectrum of ceramic artists in the region. He was especially inspired by the work of California ceramicist Robert Arneson. Downing studied with several well known ceramic artists in the San Francisco Bay Area. In 1996 he began teaching ceramics courses at various institutions and is currently an Associate Professor and the Ceramics Area Head and at San Francisco State University.

Exhibition Dates: April 24 – May 25th , 2013

Conference Dates: April 26^th and  May 28^th

The California Conference for the Advancement of Ceramic Art is the largest professional art function in the region, hosted by the John Natsoulas Center for the Arts. Now, on its 25th year, this event continues to bring the leading national and international ceramic artists to Northern California for a weekend of creative instruction and collaboration. The Conference will take place Friday April 26- April 28, 2013. It is a ceramics weekend of over 50 exhibitions, many hands-on clay demonstrations and interactive clay events. In two days, visitors can see the biggest collection of student work from over 50 schools, as well as established artists. Featured artists will include; Lisa Clague, Rebekah Bogard, Judy Moonelis, Jeff Mongrain, Ivette Guier, Clayton Keyes, and Tony Perry. This grassroots conference and festival will give everyone an opportunity to view work by students of every level of learning and well-known artists.

The John Natsoulas Center for the Arts will hold its annual gallery-wide 30 Ceramics Sculptors exhibition in concurrence with the conference. The work will be on display from April 24-May 25, 2013. This exhibition was first conceived in 1986, a collaboration between Robert Arneson and John Natsoulas, and continues the ceramic traditions made famous by instructors and students of the University of California, Davis Art Department and the University of California, Davis and local ceramic artists.

Contact: Nancy Resler

Telephone: (530) 756-3938

Email: art@natsoulas.com

Site: http://www.natsoulas.com/