Hitomi Hosono
The japanese ceramic artist’s subject and theme and influenced by various botanicals — blooming foliage, leaves and flowers studied in the garden, as well as collected memories of nature from her own childhood in japan, where her family runs a small rice farm.
‘I find myself drawn to the intricacy of plants, examining the veins of a leaf, how its edges are shaped, the layering of a flower’s petals. I look, I touch, I draw.’
The artist’s technique draws initial reference from the 18th century potter josiah wedgwood, who used thin ceramic reliefs or ‘sprigs’ applied as surface decoration to a piece. through extensive experimentation with different methods and clay bodies, two new sculptural ways to use approach emerged: one is to cover the entire surface of a shape with sprigs while the other is to construct the art object solely out of many layers of the relief, carving each with modified dental tools to add incredibly fine details.colossal.com/
Working from a tiny table in the nook of her living room, California-based artist Angela Schwer crafts explosive dahlias, gardenias, poppies, fungi, and sea creatures all from a custom blend of polymer clays. Meant primarily as decorative objects, the dense handmade pieces are surprisingly detailed, assembled from hundreds of perfectly formed clay pieces and formed into large tiles that can be hung from a wall or set on a table. You can see more in her online shop, Dilly Pad.
colossal.com/
London-based artist Rachel Dein of Tactile Studio has spent the last few years perfecting the art of plaster casting, an admittedly straightforward process of pressing objects into clay and then filling the voids with combinations of plaster and concrete. However Dein’s time spent as a prop making apprentice for the English National Opera, The Globe Theatre, and The Royal Opera House, has greatly influenced her techniques, elevating a simple craft process into something else entirely.
http://www.thisiscolossal.com/2015/10/plaster-cast-plant-fossils-rachel-dein/
