Today we’d like to introduce you to Blake Kennedy.
Every artist has a unique story. Can you briefly walk us through yours?
I am originally from the piedmont region of North Carolina. Around age ten my folks moved us to Wilmington, NC, and I spent the next nine years living next to the Atlantic Ocean. The relationship I developed with the coastal landscape became, and still is, a consequential influence on me. I then moved to the mountains of North Carolina to study art at Appalachian State University and graduated earning a BFA in Studio Art with concentrations in Ceramics and Sculpture. After graduation, I maintained a studio practice in the Boone, NC area until moving to San Antonio, TX in early 2015 for my current position as the Ceramics Studio Technician and faculty member at Southwest School of Art.
Please tell us about your art.
Constantly drawn to nature’s many different landscapes, my central interest is in liminal areas between a landscape’s changing topography. For example, where an ocean meets a shoreline. This space is never static. Instead, it remains a visual example of the landscape’s constant flux. These ambiguous points of transition ruminate, and in doing so, provide moments of reflection, memory, and growth. In a similar way, I think of working with clay as a liminal process. The material goes through a constant transformation as the object is being formed. The pieces I make reference to the different landscapes I have experienced, and the impressions they have left on me. My studio practice alternates between exploring these landscapes through utilitarian pieces, and investigating them in more sculptural installation based works. I enjoy going back and forth between the two avenues of exploration. Both ways of working bring with them opportunities, expectations, limits, and challenges. For example, I might make a series of cups that all work together creating a dimensional landscape. Although I am thinking about them as a whole, it is still important to me that each functions well as an individual cup. The other side of that point is working on sculptural pieces allows me the ability to not worry if it functions. I can put thought and energy into other elements of the piece without the limitations of its utility. I am engaged in both ways of working, so I work both ways.
As an artist, how do you define success and what quality or characteristic do you feel is essential to success as an artist?
That is a complex question. I suppose there can be multiple definitions of success for an artist. Some would say financial stability, notoriety, solo exhibitions, being collected by a museum, or supporting yourself solely from your work constitutes success. At this moment, for me, success is being able to make quality work that keeps me engaged in my studio and challenges me to grow both conceptually and technically. I do not necessarily separate successes in my artistic endeavors from successes in my life outside my art practice. Success is also feeling excited and grateful about where I am at in my life right now. I have an amazingly supportive partner, who along with our four dogs, two cats, and two chickens, have helped create a wonderful home.
As far as a quality or characteristic that is essential to success as an artist, I would say having the ability to fail and the enthusiasm for trying again are critical. Also, a willingness, even desire, to always be learning.
How or where can people see your work? How can people support your work?
Currently, I have work in an exhibition at Manifest Gallery in Cincinnati, OH which is up through the end of the month. My work is also being carried by Maison, an architecture and design firm which has a retail showroom in downtown Rockport, TX. At the beginning of this year fellow artist (and wife) Kimberly Rumfelt and I founded Good Hope Studios which will encompass both our artistic practices as well as a line of collaborative work. Once the new website is up and running, hopefully by summer, work will be available for purchase through an online store.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.blakekennedyclay.com
- Instagram: @blakennedyclay and @goodhopestudios
Image Credit:
Blake Kennedy
Getting in touch: VoyageHouston is built on recommendations from the community; it’s how we uncover hidden gems, so if you know someone who deserves recognition please let us know here.
