AFA Winter 2017

Winter 80 www.afamag.com |  www.incollect.com Peter Voulkos (1924–2002), plate, 1981. Thrown and altered stoneware, Diam. 22, H. 5 in. Purchase 2002 Membership Endowment Fund, Mrs. James C. Brady Bequest Fund, Charles W. Engelhard Bequest Fund and Dr. and Mrs. Earl LeRoy Wood Fund (2002.23.4). That same artistic parallel can be drawn between the art pottery on display within sight of the Contemporary Craft Gallery, and the massive scarred and pummeled plate by Peter Voulkos that hangs on the gallery wall. A revolutionary ceramicist, Voulkos exaggerated forms, replacing functional limitations with a sculptural freedom of expression. I don’t venerate Voulkos as a sculptor; I admire him as a potter. The fact that Voulkos’ pots can be appreciated as art is fine by me. It is his ability to manipulate clay into something powerful and new that touches me. His plate is both sculpture and drawing, in much the same way that the art pottery vases displayed down the hall were seen as both sculptural and painterly a century ago. The desire to be seen as art is not new.