Big Ed

Peter Voulkos is easily one of the most significant ceramic artists in the 20th century, credited with destroying conventions in both clay-working techniques and the expressive potential of the ancient medium. The grandiose showman ushered in a wave of non-utilitarian "expressionistic" ceramic forms with his controversial large-scale work and his unglazed, broken clay surfaces. This "Big Ed" sculpture shows the rough ash-laden surface of wood firing, and is a particularly fine example of the artist's expression through the active manipulation of raw clay combined with the reinterpretation, or literal subversion, of traditional vessel forms. Pottery's traditions are literally turned upside down and gashed.