Marie-Pierre Biau: Selected works, 2020-2022
I start my pieces by working the container (bowl, vase, cup). Often shaped using the coiling technique, sometimes by extraction, the piece builds up in a simple shape at first. The rest is more intuitive; the clay dictates the sequence; prickles, breaks, volutes come at the end with the last modeling gestures.
On the still malleable stoneware, I apply a decor of engobe or oxide, points and lines of dripping colors, or small points systematically applied with a brush or engraved into the clay. After the first firing, I often draw with an oxide pencil onto the piece. Before the final firing, partial or total enameling enhances the light and shadow of the work.
The container always loses its utility and becomes a sculpture object. My desire is not to search for a limit between container and sculpture but to find a balance between the function and its possible abstraction.
