The Unfamiliar Reflection

Product description

Part of my ‘Whatever Vases’ collection. The vessel holds ‘whatever’ odd cuts from the garden, giving all shapes of life a chance to merge into the graphics and narratives of the pot.

Inspired by medieval church statues of warriors, I free-hand carved an open narrative imagining women as the heroic warriors wearing their daily clothes. My ‘Stream of Consciousness’ carving imagines female characters wearing armoury as the Iron Maidens and corsets, where her ‘free self’ escapes through the cages. On the reverse side, while ‘she’ has been free from the constraints, she is aware of the approaching threat from the dragon. As a metaphorical representation of transforming female identity, the pot seeks your interpretation of its destination

Qi works primarily with hand-built and thrown high-fire (1220°C) white stoneware with free-hand carved and inlaid original designs. The illustrated works celebrate different carving techniques (Huahua technique in Chinese, or Mishima, and sgraffito) on ceramics and are decorated using decorative slips and underglazes.

Qi’s ceramics search for conversations and mutual encouragement between the object and her carved drawings, which are deeply inspired by Taoism and Phenomenology philosophy. The works are known for their quirky, playful and symbolic narrative representation of the transforming identity, human-nature interactions, feminism, and cultural boundaries.

Rather than following a well-planned blueprint, Qi free-hand carves the organic shapes she builds, allowing the shape of the clay and drawing determine the composition. Like a spreading vine, her expressive pictures find ways to shape the object, forming the outlines and content, vice versa, to capture the flow of consciousness, self-invented visual narratives and personal emotions. Instead of searching for uniformity and certainty, her ceramics call for a curiosity of the unknown, abnormal and asymmetrical.

Qi is also exhibiting several wall works - Ink Drawings and Watercolour / Collage works.