Bio: Mel Griffin makes ceramic wall tiles and illustrations that address the human relationship with the natural world. After earning her MFA from the University of Minnesota, she was a visiting professor at Saint John’s University in Collegeville, MN, was named Emerging Artist by both Ceramics Monthly and NCECA, and won the Leap Award from the Society of Contemporary Craft in Pittsburgh, PA. After spending two years as a long term resident at the Archie Bray Foundation in Helena, MT she decided to make Montana her home. She currently lives and works outside Helena in the Scratchgravel Hills, an area full of prickly pear cactus, jack rabbits, and coyotes. While not in the studio, she enjoys trail running with her dog and searching for wildlife.
Why I Make:
My art practice is essentially a statement of faith.
I have faith in the natural world’s ability to fill us with a sense of wonder, to elevate our minds and spirits, and to reinvigorate our reverence for life.
I have faith in art’s capacity to remind us of our own humanity, about which we so often seem to forget.
The biosphere is rich and intricate. All organisms are themselves wondrous, their individual traits the result of millions of evolutionary happenings and exacting conditions. Their interactions are particular and complex, and together create the physical and chemical equilibrium that affords human life. Both biologically and cognitively, humans are intimately linked to the natural world; the health of the landscape can affect the health of our minds.
My work seeks to directly remind the viewer of his own physicality, as well as to rekindle his sense of wonder and discovery. Making and drawing allow me to investigate fluid and profound relationships between the body, material, handmade objects, and landscape, both inside the home and out in the world. Through imagery and metaphor, line and clay, I am exploring the manner in which corporeal experience, mindfulness, memory, and mood combine to create meaning in both everyday and imagined environments.
Questions about technique, materials, and recipes? It's all here!
Why I Make:
My art practice is essentially a statement of faith.
I have faith in the natural world’s ability to fill us with a sense of wonder, to elevate our minds and spirits, and to reinvigorate our reverence for life.
I have faith in art’s capacity to remind us of our own humanity, about which we so often seem to forget.
The biosphere is rich and intricate. All organisms are themselves wondrous, their individual traits the result of millions of evolutionary happenings and exacting conditions. Their interactions are particular and complex, and together create the physical and chemical equilibrium that affords human life. Both biologically and cognitively, humans are intimately linked to the natural world; the health of the landscape can affect the health of our minds.
My work seeks to directly remind the viewer of his own physicality, as well as to rekindle his sense of wonder and discovery. Making and drawing allow me to investigate fluid and profound relationships between the body, material, handmade objects, and landscape, both inside the home and out in the world. Through imagery and metaphor, line and clay, I am exploring the manner in which corporeal experience, mindfulness, memory, and mood combine to create meaning in both everyday and imagined environments.
Questions about technique, materials, and recipes? It's all here!
| mel_griffin_cv.pdf |
