Thomas Schmidt
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Thomas Schmidt’s cracked, unglazed ceramic works at Dubhe Carreno suggest fragmentation and randomness. Schmidt directs the cracking to some degree, selectively applying pressure to hardened clay, but the details are out of his control; still, he manages to give emotional nuance to the results of his chance operations. He’s hung four rectangular slabs on the walls like paintings, giving them a humorous implied importance belied by their chaotic patterns. Blocks 3 and 4 of his “Tension and Rest Series” are clay cubes whose geometric imperfections–the faces are concave–are echoed by multiple cracks. Eight intriguingly irregular ceramic sculptures on pedestals are impossible to reduce to comprehensible objects. The rough interior of Channel, which resembles a broken squarish bowl, evokes bark. The two spiky lumps in A Held Moment suggest bleached bone fragments but also cracked mud and rock faces. These works began as cubes like the ones in the “Tension and Rest Series,” but Schmidt used a propane torch to accentuate hairline cracks, then split the cubes into pieces, some of which he later carved and sanded.
Art accompanying story in printed newspaper (not available in this archive): photo/Leslie Schwartz.
