Artist Research Assignment

Tom Bartel

Source and his website: https://tombartel.net/

Tom grew up in Cleveland, Ohio on the shores of Lake Erie. He went on to receive a Bachelor’s degree in Fine Arts at Kent State University and then got a Master’s at Indiana University-Bloomington. Tom has done lectures, workshops, and exhibitions throughout the US and internationally. He has also received Individual Artist Fellowships from the Pensylvania, Ohio, and Kentucky Arts Councils. He has worked in sculptural ceramics for over 20 years.
Tom’s work has been referred to as “contemporary monsters” which, in my opinion, perfectly describes these human-like creatures. He often models his creations off of molds of dolls. One of his common goals in his work is to show time and implied experience in the figures. Most of his work appears to be using pinch and/or coil techniques. He is often inspired by his childhood experiences in his hometown and some of the places and people that were there.
He uses mostly dull colors with pops of bright often primary colors. He uses some sort of cracking technique to decorate his creations, just to give a weathered and old feel. Overall, Tom Bartel’s work is really unique and weirdly whimsical. I like the scary ones that he creates. One thing that surprised me was how big the sculptures actually are. When seeing Tom next to one the scale is a lot bigger than you would think; the heads are around the same size as a real human’s.