Paul March: Holocene Pottery, 2016-2019
This series of sculptures developed out of the matrix-like sides of claustra. The time spent carefully constructing the mashrabiya-like structure of claustra was quite frustrating because the matrix-geometry did not appear to want to be restricted to developing in two dimensions only but to grow organically in all directions. To begin with, I called the series The Matrices, and the project went on for some years, interrupted by almost a year during which I made Another part of the World”. At some point, it became entangled with a preoccupation with the prehistoric Japanese pottery known as jōmon flame pots. As a result, the name changed to Project Holocene. As I describe on the website Art/Archaeology, “it became clear that its [the project’s] aim was to help the pots escape from the past and to become part of a present experience that had a definite but indefinable link with prehistoric, morphological changes. The point…was to feel and respond to that link in a way that accepted its enigmatic quality.” The development of the project is described in detail in the Project Holocene paper cited earlier.
Holocene 1, 2016-2019, stoneware © Paul March
