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The past year of the COVID-19 pandemic has been a period of creative exploration for British artist Susan Phillips. Driven by her interest in architecture, she continued to expand her study of the opposing elements of open and enclosed space within sculpture during the period. “With the juggle of homeschool, I have found myself thinking more about interconnection and looking at the formal qualities of void space,’ explains Susan Phillips.
As a result, she created a series of small-scale ceramic objects that directly use void space as a theme. Phillips investigates the interplay between fragment and whole, open and closed, present and absent, empty and full, independence and interdependence through the use of cutting and re-arrangements of simple, geometric elements such as circle, square, or rectangle emphasizing the idea of change. She offers a unique visual experience to the viewers challenging their perception of objects and space with each new assemblage. As the viewer moves around the object or lighting conditions change, new aspects of perception evolve, provoking new and dynamic aesthetic impressions.
My aim is not to create an image, but rather to isolate a moment within a process of continued transformation
Susan Phillips studied a BA(hons) at Falmouth College of Art and has exhibited throughout the UK. In 2014 she was awarded the Gold Medal for Craft + Design at the National Eisteddfod of Wales, as well as being shortlisted for the Soho sculpture prize. In both 2016 and 2018 her work was long-listed for the aesthetica art prize and in 2017, won the VIA arts prize, the Ibero-American themed arts prize hosted at the Embassy of Brazil, London. Recently in 2020 Phillips’s work the highly commended at the Korean International Ceramic Biennale and exhibited as part of the International Kogei Award 2021 exhibition in Toyama, Japan.
