Oil and tea can
Kirsten COELHO: artist
In many ways Coelho’s beautiful yet austere ceramics are a meditation on the passage of time. A close look at the apparently pristine glaze reveals that these objects are not perfect. We see traces of rust; written on the surface of these objects is the start of a process of decay. Although the rusting effect is achieved by disrupting the pure white glaze with iron oxide on the surface, the effect is to create a relationship between inside and outside as it appears the rust has worked its way through to the exterior from the interior.
Coelho trained initially in Australia before spending most of the 1990s in the UK, being influenced by the British studio pottery tradition. She is captivated by Australian colonial paintings of interiors, and those of the nineteenth-century Danish painter Vilhelm Hammershøi. What interests her are the items of domestic utilitarian wares, particularly enamel wares, which are often to be seen in these paintings. Initially produced as a working-class version of fine china for the home, the whiteness of the enamel was intended to echo the translucence of porcelain. In a circular way, Coelho’s works are an evocation in fine porcelain of those utilitarian objects which once existed in metal. Any sense of a linear history is further disrupted by the fact that her newly made items carry the evidence of deterioration on them so that their future is already their present.
Coelho trained initially in Australia before spending most of the 1990s in the UK, being influenced by the British studio pottery tradition. She is captivated by Australian colonial paintings of interiors, and those of the nineteenth-century Danish painter Vilhelm Hammershøi. What interests her are the items of domestic utilitarian wares, particularly enamel wares, which are often to be seen in these paintings. Initially produced as a working-class version of fine china for the home, the whiteness of the enamel was intended to echo the translucence of porcelain. In a circular way, Coelho’s works are an evocation in fine porcelain of those utilitarian objects which once existed in metal. Any sense of a linear history is further disrupted by the fact that her newly made items carry the evidence of deterioration on them so that their future is already their present.
Title
Oil and tea can
Artist/Maker and role
Kirsten COELHO: artist
Date
2009
Medium
matt white glaze, banded iron oxide
Measurements
Oil can: 26.5 x 9cm
Tea can: 16.5 x 10cm
Tea can: 16.5 x 10cm
Credit line
Purchased through the Peter Fogarty Design Fund, The Art Gallery of Western Australia Foundation, 2009
The State Art Collection, The Art Gallery of Western Australia
Accession number
2009/0082.a-b