Love so ordinary

Christina Pitsch

Jewett Art Gallery

Oct. 26 - Dec. 14, 2018

installation view of a white-walled gallery with wood floor; at left, 7 gray and pale green ovals in a row on the wall; at rear, a gold-leafed wood pallet upright against the wall and a large grid of pale green tiles on the wall; on the floor, a series of low white pedestals with variously positioned pale green ceramic cinder blocks

The sculptures and installations in Love so ordinary are an examination of cast-off or overlooked forms that occupy the space around us. Christina Pitsch questions assumed hierarchies of objects, taste, and markers of class, bringing concepts like importance, beauty, and decorative value into direct conversation with the unimportant, the worthless, the tacky.

This latest series of works was inspired by ancient Song Dynasty celadon. Historically, celadon glaze was valued for its ability to mimic the colors and luminosity of jade, and was intended to appeal to the elite. The cinderblock is a low-cost building block, an extruded shape made from a mixture of cement. It is easily mass-produced, cheap and durable, heavy, often considered clumsy or ungraceful. Pitsch recreates these forms in slipcast porcelain and bone china, the fussy, delicate material more often associated with fine china and figurines. Not only does this material void the functionality of the cinderblock - the sculptures in this show are much too delicate to serve as structural forms - it also creates a kind of artificial importance and preciousness. The process needed to make cinderblock from these materials, involving a complex multi-part mold, means that far more labor is expended on each unit than would ever make sense for a standard cinderblock. The complciated solutions needed to make these pieces bring a level of absurdity to the work that Pitsch mines for a constant questioning of her practice and the purposes and messages of the objects that she creates.

Love so ordinary was on view in the Jewett Art Gallery from October 26 - December 14, 2018.

angled view of a grid of glossy celadon green tiles with cardboard textures

close up on the place where the corners of 4 glossy celadon green cardboard-textured tiles meet

at left, a gray cinderblock suspended against gallery wall with a bright orange strap; a few more gray cinderblocks are nearby; green cinderblocks on a cluster of pedestals are visible in the distance on the right

installation view of a white-walled, wood-floored gallery with celadon green tile grid installations on left and right walls, an installation of gray cinderblocks on white pedestals against one wall, and an installation of celadon green cinderblocks on a series of low white pedestals in the middle of the floor

close up image of a gold-leafed wood pallet, showing textures and dings in the surface

close-cropped image of a gold-leafed wood pallet

close up on 2 glossy celadon green cinderblocks on a low white pedestal; other installations are visible in the background

three pure white and off-white cinderblock sculptures on white pedestals; the rear sculpture is partially torn and bent

looking down a white wall at a series of thin ceramic ovals, patterned like bubble wrap, in either matte gray or glossy celadon green

view across a number of glossy celadon green porcelain cinderblocks arranged on low white pedestals

close up view along the top of a horizontal glossy celadon green porcelain cinderblock; other cinderblock sculptures are visible in the background

matte gray porcelain cinderblock suspended from a bright orange strap against a white wall

a number of glossy celadon green porcelain cinderblocks variously arranged on 3 low white pedestals in a gallery; taller pedestals with a few white cinderblocks, and 2 people in the gallery, are visible in the background

high angle view of a white walled gallery with wood floor, various celadon green and gray cinderblock and tiled sculptures arranged on the walls and white pedestals; a gold-leafed wood pallet leans against the far wall

a woman with long brown hair and a black shirt standing behind white pedestals holding celadon green cinderblocks

Christina Pitsch

New Hampshire-based artist Christina Pitsch works in sculpture, installation, and print. She holds a BA from Sarah Lawrence College and an MFA from the New York State College of Ceramics at Alfred University. She has exhibited extensively both in the US and internationally. Her exhibitions in the greater Boston area include shows at Kingston Gallery, the New Art Center, and the Boston Sculptor's Gallery. She has had numerous residencies, including multiple stints as an artist-in-residence at the European Ceramic Work Center in the Netherlands. She received a Berkshire Taconic Community Foundation Artist's Resource Trust grant in 2015. The artwork in this exhibition was made at sundaymorning@ekwe.

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