At a time when art and cultural institutions are working to embrace diverse forms and ideas, it is no surprise that the intersection of art, craft and design at the heart of ceramics and its global histories are part of a new discourse. It’s one that the SVA has engaged in for decades with ceramics courses offered in several of its undergraduate, graduate and continuing education departments.

The medium’s growing presence as a highly regarded art form in contemporary art galleries and museums challenges a centuries-old binary in Western culture between fine art and craft, one that is inextricably linked to broader questions of access, visibility and invisibility. Notably, The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s 2021 exhibition “Shapes from Out of Nowhere: Ceramics from the Robert A. Ellison Jr. Collection,” which featured a gift of 125 modern and contemporary ceramics from Robert A. Ellison, Jr., made in honor of the museum’s 150th anniversary, changed the game.

Craft, which includes ceramics, has historically been associated with women, labor, utilitarian and functional objects, and by default disregarded in the realm of fine art, or relegated to the domain of the decorative. However, in the recent past a concerted challenge to this type of thinking has been underway, quietly building momentum, particularly in feminist art circles.

The iconic 1970s work by artist and feminist Judy Chicago, The Dinner Party, a long-term installation at the Brooklyn Museum since 2007, is perhaps one of the most significant challenges to the status quo. The multimedia work consists of a variety of art forms associated with “women’s work,” one of which is ceramics, in the form of 39 place settings on a triangular table in an installation that honors 1,038 women in history by name.

A feature from the fall/winter 2021 “Visual Arts Journal”