Edith Garcia will be exhibiting for our group show, Body Continuum, which focuses on individual artist’s expressions regarding the human form. 

Garcia works with ceramics to record her unique, individual life experience. The small things that transpire each day, addressing contemporaneous issues specific to the human condition and she grafts them onto site-specific installations and sculptures. Perceived in a playful manner, in her works you can see the human body shifting, elongating, and forming. Her use of color and multiples has roots in contemporary pop art and brings awareness to the body as a commodification of civilization. Her works depict forms that are no longer perceived as human, but reflections of the society that has cultivated them.

In her piece “ 27 personifications and 1 perception”, (which consists of 10 individual portraits to comprise one installation) the figure takes on multiple personalities, existing as childlike self-portraits of all people. The individual “personalities” that make up the whole juxtapose the idea of permanence and the impermanence of self. As the viewer roves their eyes over the whole installation, it is as if the personifications are growing and changing in real time, acting as interpretations of human development in motion. Each personification is separate in it’s togetherness,  their uniqueness and individuality is defined by the starkness around them. Always changing, they appear quiet and disturbed, demanding a second look. They might even strike up a conversation with you with out saying a word. The deep mending of human emotion, traumas, emotions that love, relationships, family and anything that might evoke the human experience is brought to life in these personifications, allowing catharsis to breathe heavily.

In 2012 Edith Garcia published Ceramics and the Human Figure. This publication has direct relevance to her investigations for Body Continuum. Exploring the concepts behind the publication Garcia states:

“Representations of the human form through artistic expression has always existed in clay form, and it continues to evolve today. From exploring the whole figure, through fragmentation to the use of the body as a means to create, artists today are working with clay and the human form in very unconventional ways across the globe. Contemporary artists have learned to play with the possibilities of materials and form more so than ever before, with digital technologies enabling and enhancing the creative process.

This publication features works by key ceramic artists that work within the realm of the human form, showcasing and discussing individual artists with practices within the field of installation and sculpture as well as those incorporating new technologies. The artists are divided by themes, with each chapter giving a short introduction, and then going on to display the work and ideas of each, showing the large variety of work being made today. A chapter is also included on making methods, giving making sequences of the more innovative and challenging methods used by some of these artists.”

– Edith Garcia